THE 


Story  of  the  Prairies 


OR 


THE  LANDSCAPE  GEOLOGY  OF 
NORTH  DAKOTA 


BY 


DANIEL  E.  WILLARD,  A.  M., 

Professor  of  Geology,  State  Agricultural  College,  Fargo, 
North  Dakota. 


FIFTH   EDITION. 


PRINTED  FOR  THE  AUTHOR  BY 

RAND,  McNALLY  &  COMPANY,     , 
CHICAGO.  NEW  YORK.  LONDON. 


Copyright,  1907, 
BY  DANIEL  E.  WILLARD, 


PREFACE. 


A  book  justifies  its  existence  if  it  supplies  a  need  or  assists  in  any  way 
in  solving  the  problem  of  life.  There  is  a  noticeable  lack  of  books  suited 
to  the  general  reader  in  the  branch  of  science  which  deals  with  the  earth 
upon  which  we  live.  Splendid  contributions  to  knowledge  have  been 
made  in  this  line  in  recent  years,  but  many  of  the  best  things  that  have 
been  written  are  practically  inaccessible  to  the  average  reader  both  by 
reason  of  the  technical  character  of  the  language  used  and  by  the  fact  that 
the  material  is  often  contained  in  large  volumes  unhandy  for  general  use. 
That  these  contributions  are  of  great  value  to  the  people  is  indicated 
by  the  large  amounts  which  are  annually  expended  by  the  National 
'Government  and  by  the  State  surveys  for  their  compilation  and 
publication. 

To  present  in  untechnical  language  a  scientific  statement  of  a  subject 
is  not  an  easy  task.  Whether  the  present  book  accomplishes  this  or  not  an 
intelligent  public  will  soon  discover.  The  author  has  had  in  mind,  as 
a  class  to  whom  he  would  make  every  page  readable,  those  who  have 
reached  the  degree  of  maturity  represented  by  the  sixth  and  seventh 
grades  in  the  public  schools.  If  the  book  is  intelligible  to  pupils  rep- 
resented by  these  grades  it  should  be  understood  by  the  average  citizen 
who  is  interested  in  knowing  about  his  own  State.  It  has  seemed  impos- 
sible to  avoid  the  somewhat  technical  character  of  certain  portions,  owing 
to  the  intricate  and  difficult  nature  of  the  subject.  It  may  be  asked 
if  these  passages  might  not  have  been  omitted.  To  do  this  would 
have  marred  the  book  as  a  whole,  and  it  seemed  best  to  carry  out  the 
original  plan,  leaving  to  the  discretion  of  teachers  what  part  should  be 
omitted  in  class  work.  Such  subjects  as  the  causes  of  the  changes  of 
level  of  Lake  Agassiz,  the  distribution  of  the  lakes  of  the  State,  and 
the  chapter  on  "  The  Beginnings  of  North  Dakota,"  may  be  omitted 
where  these  topics  are  beyond  the  mental  grasp  of  the  pupils.  But 
to  have  omitted  them  from  the  book  would  have  left  unanswered  questions 
which  the  more  advanced  pupils  in  the  high  schools,  and  many  general 
readers,  will  be  certain  to  ask. 

It  is  the  author's  opinion  that  not  enough  attention  is  given  in  our 
schools  to-  instruction  relative  to  the  character  and  resources  of  our 
own  State.  Not  enough  attention  to  our  own  State  is  given  by  the  teach- 

808772 


iv  PREFACE. 

ers  in  their  private  studies,  and  not  enough  careful  reading  is  done  along 
this  line  by  the  average  citizen. 

In  geography  instruction  in  our  schools  why  do  we  need  to  go  to  South 
America  and  Asia  and  the  uttermost  parts  of  the  earth  for  illustrations  of 
land  forms?  Why  do  we  need  to  study  about  the  river  systems,  hills, 
plateaus,  lakes,  soils,  and  resources  of  states  which  are  hundreds  of  miles 
away  in  preference  to  those  of  our  own  State  ?  When  the  child  has  gained 
a  general  idea  of  the  earth  as  a  whole,  and  of  North  America  more  partic- 
ularly, why  should  he  be  required  to  go  to  states  and  countries  which  are 
far  away  for  concrete  examples  ?  Have  we  not  rivers,  lakes,  and  marshes, 
hills,  valleys,  plateaus,  and  plains  in  our  own  State,  which  are  more  access- 
ible and  just  as  real  as  those  of  other  states  ?  Have  we  not  types  of  land- 
scapes, developing  river  systems,  desiccating  lakes,  mineral  and  forest 
problems  ?  Indeed,  there  are  no  better  examples  in  the  world.  And 
the  writers  of  text-books  for  the  use  of  schools  in  the  Eastern  states  are 
now  coming  to  the  far  West,  to  the  Red  River  Valley  and  elsewhere",  for 
examples  to  illustrate  the  great  principles  of  geographic  science. 

The  author  has  sought  to  reach  three  classes  of  readers  in  this 
book.  The  primary  purpose  has  been  to  adapt  the  language  and  treat- 
ment to  pupils  in  the  higher  grades  of  public  schools.  This  purpose 
has  been  constantly  kept  in  mind,  for  a  large  number  of  boys  and  girls  to 
whom  a  knowledge  of  the  resources  of  the  State  ought  to  be  of  the  great- 
est value  will  never  enter  -the  high  school.  While  some  portions  are  rather 
difficult  for  pupils  of  the  grammar  grades  it  is  thought  that  the  book  as  a 
whole  will  make  a  profitable  half  year's  work  in  the  high  school,  satisfying 
the  requirement  of  the  State  Course  of  Study  in  Geology  or  Physiography. 
And  it  is  hoped  to  reach  a  large  class  of  readers  who  have  entered 
the  practical  school  of  life,  but  who  would  be  benefited  by  a  fuller  and 
more  accurate  knowledge  of  the  character  and  resources  of  the  State 
in  which  they  live. 

It  has  been  impracticable  in  a  book  of  this  character  to  give  specific 
reference  in  the  body  of  the  text  to  the  authors  consulted,  but  the  author 
wishes  to  give  fullest  credit  for  the  use  of  this  information. 

More  than  all  others  the  author  is  indebted  to  the  classic  work  of  Prof. 
Warren  Upham,  "The  Glacial  Lake  Agassiz,"  a  monograph  of  the 
United  States  Geological  Survey.  This  work  leaves  little  to  be  added 
regarding  the  landscape  geology  of  the  Red  River  Valley  and  the  adjacent 
portions  of  the  State.  He  would  be  a  bold  student  who  would  attempt  to 
cover  the  field  better  than  has  been  done  in  this  comprehensive  quarto  of 
more  than  six  hundred  pages,  but  its  very  elaborateness  renders  it  incon- 
venient for  those  to  whom  its  contents  should  be  of  the  greatest  value. 

The  author  of  this  volume  has  drawn  freely  from  Professor  Upham's 
treatise,  hoping  to  bring  its  vast  fund  of  useful  information  within  reach 
of  the  bus)'-  citizen  who  would  not  be  likely  to  read  a  larger  work. 


PREFACE.  V 

Through  the  very  kind  permission  of  Professor  Upham  a  number  of  the 
illustrations  in  his  work  have  been  either  redrawn  and  adapted  to  the 
purpose  of  the  present  work,  or  copied  by  the  Bureau  of  Engraving  at 
Washington. 

The  author  is  also  indebted  to  the  valuable  bulletins  by  Prof.  J.  E.  Todd, 
of  the  University  of  South  Dakota,  for  much  that  is  here  given 
regarding  the  Altamont  and  Gary  Moraines  and  the  landscape  features 
connected  with  these  in  Logan  and  Mclntosh  and  adjoining  counties, 
and  also  for  facts  regarding  Lake  Dakota  in  Dickey  County,  and  for 
several  illustrations. 

The  valuable  "  Report  of  the  State  Geological  Survey  of  North  Dakota," 
by  Prof.  E.  J.  Babcock  of  the  University  of  North  Dakota,  Grand  Forks, 
has  been  drawn  upon  in  the  treatment  of  the  coal  deposits  of  the  State,  and 
the  author  wishes  to  express  his  appreciation  for  the  kind  permission  to 
use  several  plates  from  this  Report  in  the  present  work. 

The  author  acknowledges  his  personal  indebtedness  to  Prof.  War- 
ren Upham,  Secretary  of  the  State  Historical  Society  of  Minnesota  ;  to 
Prof.  Charles  M.  Hall,  of  the  Agricultural  College  of  North  Dakota  ;  Prof. 
E.  J.  Babcock,  of  the  University  of  North  Dakota  ;  and  to  Miss  Lillian  V. 
Lambert,  Instructor  in  English  in  the  East  Side  High  School,  Des 
Moines,  Iowa,  who  read  this  book  in  manuscript,  and  who  by  their 
scholarly  and  valuable  criticisms  greatly  increased  its  value. 

Acknowledgment  is  made  to  all  those  who  have  so  kindly  assisted  in 
the  preparation  of  the  drawings  which  illustrate  the  book.  The  writer's 
thanks  are  particularly  due  to  Miss  M.  Emma  Davis  and  to  Prof. 
Thomas  H.  Grosvenor,  members  of  the  faculty  of  the  Mayville  State 
Normal  School.  Many  illustrations  which  needed  to  be  drawn  under  the 
author's  direction  were  made  possible  by  their  assistance.  Pres. 
Joseph  Carhart,  under  whose  supervision  the  author  has  for  several  years 
had  the  pleasure  of  teaching,  has  given  practical  suggestions  which  have 
been  of  great  value  in  the  preparation  of  this  volume. 

If  this  book  serves  the  purpose  of  making  the  people  of  North  Dakota 
better  acquainted  with  their  State,  and  thereby  enlarges  their  appreciation 
of  the  opportunities  which  belong  to  them  as  citizens  of  this  growing 
commonwealth,  the  author  will  feel  that  he  is  amply  repaid  for  the  labor 
which  has  been  expended  upon  it. 

D.  E.  W. 

Mayville,  North  Dakota,  State  Normal  School. 
May  /,  igos. 


PREFACE  TO  THE   FIFTH  EDITION, 


It  is  a  source  of  gratification  to  the  author  that  the  demand  for  this 
work  has  made  the  fifth  edition  possible.  The  sales  of  the  book  prove 
that  the  public  will  read  the  literature  of  science  provided  it  is  expressed 
in  simple  terms  and  in  readable  form.  The  continued  demand  for  the 
book  for  class  use  in  schools,  by  teachers,  and  by  the  public  generally, 
makes  a  new  edition  necessary,  and  affords  an  opportunity  for  the  addition 
of  new  matter  which  the  progress  of  geological  investigations  in  the  State, 
during  the  five  years  since  the  book  first  appeared,  has.  made  possible. 
Subjects  relating  to  some  portions  of  the  State  could  not  be  as  fully  treated 
in  the  earlier  editions  as  it  was  then  felt  their  importance  required,  owing 
to  lack  of  sufficient  knowledge.  An  effort  has  been  made  to  supply  this 
lack  in  the  present  edition.  Particularly  does  this  apply  to  the  western 
half  of  the  State.  The  number  of  illustrations  has  been  greatly  increased, 
since  it  has  been  the  experience  of  the  author  that  pictures  are  often  the 
most  valuable  reading. 

The  author  wishes  to  express  his  appreciation  of  the  kindly  reception 
the  book  has  received.  The  cordial  adoption  of  the  book  by  school 
boards,  superintendents,  and  teachers,  and  the  liberal  sales  to  professional 
men,  real  estate  men,  farmers,  and  citizens  generally,  have  fully  justified 
the  author's  notion  that  there  should  be  more  study  of  our  own  State  by 
pupils,  teachers,  and  the  people  generally.  North  Dakota  is  preeminently 
an  agricultural  state,  and  the  soil  is  her  greatest  resource.  The  soil  is  the 
surface  geologic  formation,  and  therefore  ought  to  form  a  part  of  the 
course  of  study  of  every  pupil  in  the  schools,  and  should  be  embraced  in 
the  private  readings  of  every  intelligent  citizen.  The  book  is  now  in  use 
as  a  class  room  text  in  many  of  the  best  high  schools  of  the  State,  and 
in  a  great  number  of  the  graded  and  ungraded  public  schools,  as  also  in 
several  of  the  State  educational  institutions. 

The  author  wishes  to  express  his  obligation  to  Professor  H.  V.  Hibbard, 
of  Chicago,  for  assistance  rendered  by  him  in  the  preparation  of  the  chap- 
ters relating  to  the  plateau  region  of  the  western  portion  of  the  State,  and 
also  for  the  use  which  has  been  made  of  the  work  done  by  him  for  the 
U.  S.  Geological  Survey  under  the  author's  direction  on  the  Sheyenne  and 
Maple  Valleys. 

D.    E.  W. 

State  Agricultural  College, 
December, 


THE  TABLE  OF  CONTENTS. 


PAGE 

CHAPTER  THE  FIRST — The  Landscape,  -  -  -  11 

CHAPTER  THE  SECOND — Excursions  Afield,  -  20 

CHAPTER  THE  THIRD — The  Work  of  Ice,  -  30 

CHAPTER  THE  FOURTH — An  Excursion  to  Some  Glaciers,  -  -  39 
CHAPTER  THE  FIFTH — The  Great  Ice-Sheet  in  North  Dakota,  -  -47 

CHAPTER  THE  SIXTH — More  Excursions,  -  61 

CHAPTER  THE  SEVENTH — North  Dakota,  The  Old  and  the  New,  -  71 

CHAPTER  THE  EIGHTH — Glacial  Lake  Agassiz,  79 

CHAPTER  THE  NINTH — The  Deltas  and  Beaches  of  Lake  Agassiz,  92 

CHAPTER  THE  TENTH — Other  Extinct  Glacial  Lakes,  -  112 

CHAPTER  THE  ELEVENTH — The  History  of  Devils  Lake,  -  -  123 

CHAPTER  THE  TWELFTH — The  Sheyenne  River,  -  131 

CHAPTER  THE  THIRTEENTH — The  History  of  Maple  River,  _  .  _  143 

CHAPTER  THE  FOURTEENTH — The  Lakes  of  North  Dakota,  -  151 

CHAPTER  THE  FIFTEENTH — Salt  and  Alkaline  Waters  in  Lakes,  -  154 
CHAPTER  THE  SIXTEENTH — Map  Studies:  Distribution  of  the  Lakes  upon  the 

Landscape,  157 

CHAPTER  THE  SEVENTEENTH — Lakes  as  a  Landscape  Feature.  -  166 

CHAPTER  THE  EIGHTEENTH — The  Bad  Lands, -  173 

CHAPTER  THE  NINETEENTH — The  Coal  Beds  of  North  Dakota,  ....  190 

CHAPTER  THE  TWENTIETH — The  Beginnings  of  North  Dakota,  -  -  202 

CHAPTER  THE  TWENTY-FIRST — The  Coteaus  of  the  Missouri,  -  -  213 

CHAPTER  THE  TWENTY-SECOND — The  Plateau  Region  of  North  Dakota,  -  -  229 

CHAPTER  THE  TWENTY-THIRD — Agriculture  West  of  the  Missouri  River,  -  245 

CHAPTER  THE  TWENTY-FOURTH — The  Water  Supply, 258 

CHAPTER  THE  TWENTY-FIFTH — A  Study  of  the  Soils, 269 

CHAPTER  THE  TWENTY-SIXTH — Minerals  in  North  Dakota,  -  291 

CHAPTER  THE  TWENTY-SEVENTH — The  Future  of  North  Dakota,  -  -  303 
CHAPTER  THE  TWENTY-EIGHTH — Geology  from  a  Car  Window:  The  Great 

Northern  Lines, -  313 

CHAPTER  THE  TWENTY-NINTH — Geology  from  a  Car  Window:  The  Northern 

Pacific  Lines,  -  -  335 

CHAPTER  THE  THIRTIETH — Geology  from  a  Car  Window:  The  Soo  Line,  -  350 


APPENDIX — Rainfall  in  North  Dakota. 362 


A  LIST  OF  THE   ILLUSTRATIONS. 


FIG.     i— A  Geological  Map  of  North  Dakota,        -        -         -        -  _     Frontispiece 

FIG.     2 — Showing  Erosion  of  Young  Valleys  on  Hilly  Landscape,     -  14 

FIG.    3 — Diagram  of  a  Young  Valley,    -         -                                      -  .         -         _     !6 

FIG.    4 — Cross  Section  of  a  Young  Valley,  17 

FIG.     5 — A  Cutting  Coulee,  or  Young  Valley,         -                  -         -  -         -         -     18 

FIG.    6 — In  the  East  They  Work  the  Land  on  Both  Sides,        -  20 

FIG.     7 — In  North  Dakota  Enough  Can  Be  Raised  on  One  Side,  -  -         -         -     21 

FIG.    8 — Three  Types  of  Landscape,          --______          22 

FIG.    9 — Map  Showing  Position  of  Extinct  Glacial  Lakes  and  Direction  of  Ice 

Movement,   ----  ____^j 

FIG.  10 — Movement  of  Pitch  Illustrated,  -         -         -         -         -         -  -         -34 

FIG.  ii — View  Along  the  Top  of  a  Terminal  Moraine,    -  -     36 

FIG.  12 — The  Snow-field  on  a  Mountain  Top,     -                                      .  39 

FIG.  13 — A  Glacier  and  Terminal  Moraine,    -  -     40 

FIG.  14 — An  Ice  Cave,        -  4I 

FIG.  15 — An  Ice  Cascade,       -_-__  --42 

FIG.  1 6 — Terminal  Moraine  and  Front  of  Glacier,      -         -  43 

FIG.  1 7 — Terminal  Moraine  and  Ice  Front  Crowding  Upon  It,  45 

FIG.  1 8 — Terminal  Moraine  Wasted  by  Glacial  Stream,     -         -  45 
FIG.  19 — An  Old  Moraine,      -----______     45 

FIG.  i9a — Map  Showing  Great  Ice  Sheet  of  North  America,  Opposite  47 

FIG.  20 — Dakota  and  Minnesota  Glaciers,      -         -  -     48 

FIG.  21 — Cross  Section  of  Valley  of  Glacial  Stream,  -  49 

FIG.  22 — Beaver  Lake  and  Glacial  Channels,  51 

FIG.  23 — The  Ice  Sheet  at  Time  of  Formation  of  Outer  Moraine,  52 

FIG.  24 — Small  Hill  Being  Planed  Down  by  Ice,    -  53 

FIG.  25 — Formation  of  Moraine  and  Stratification  of  Ice,  54 

FIG.  26 — Showing  Moraine,  Being  Crowded  Upon  by  Moving  Ice,  54 

FIG.  27 — A  Striated  and  Polished  Boulder,  55 

FIG.  28 — Granite  Pebble,  Showing  Ice  Planing  and  Striae,    -  55 

FIG.  29 — Striae  on  Quartzite,  South  Dakota,     -  56 

FIG.  30 — Hills  Worn  Down  by  Action  of  Ice,         -  57 

FIG.  31 — Ideal  Sections  of  the  Turtle  Mountain  Plateau,  -  57 

FIG.  32 — A  Veneered  Hill,     -  58 

FIG.  33 — In  the  Hills  Southwest  of  Minot,  60 

FIG.  34 — A  Huge  "Foreigner,"  62 

FIG.  35 — Section  of  a  Gravel  Pit,        -  64 

FIG,  36 — A  Joint  Moraine,      -         -  -     68 

FIG.  37 — A  Glacier  and  Its  Moraine,  -  69 
FIG.  38 — Map  of  North  Dakota,  Showing  Highlands,     ------     73 

FIG.  39 — The  Tributaries  of  the  Red  River  of  the  North,  75 

FIG.  40— Contour  Mayville  and  Westward,    -  87 

FIG.  41 — Section  Across  Beach  Ridge,        -  88 

FIG.  42 — Profile  Across  Beaches  at  Wheatland,     -         -         ->        -  -         -         -89 

FIG.  43 — Section  Across  Red  River  Valley  at  Wahpeton,  89 
FIG.  44 — Section  Across  Red  River  Valley  at  Fargo,     ------     90 

FIG.  45 — Section  Across  Red  River  Valley  at  Grand  Forks,       -         -  -        •-          90 
FIG.  46 — Section  Across  Red  River  Valley  near  International  Boundary,      -         -     90 

FIG.  47 — Stratified  Clay,  Bottom  of  Lake  Agassiz,    -         -         -         -  -         -          91 

FIG.  48— Profile  of  Elk  Valley  Delta,     -         -  -     93 

FIG.  49 — Section  Across  Sheyenne  Delta,  -  -          94 

FIG.  50 — Delta  on  Campus,  University  of  Chicago,        -  -     95 


A    LIST    OF    THE    ILLUSTRATIONS.  9 

PAGE 

FIG.  51 — Section,  Elk  Valley  Delta  Showing  Stratification,        -  97 

FIG.  52 — Angular  Outlines,  Not  Passed  Over  by  the  Ice-Sheet,  99 

FIG.  53 — Smooth  Outlines,  Showing  Effects  of  Moving  Ice,        -  99 

FIG.  54 — Profile  of  "The  Ridge"  and  Beaches  at  Inkster,      -  -  100 
FIG.  55 — Profile  Park  River  and  Westward,       -         -         -         -                  -         -101 

FIG.  56 — Relationship  Between  Higher  and  Lower  Beaches  of  Lake  Agassiz,        -  105 
FIG.  57 — Multiple  Character  of  Beaches,    -  -         -        106 

FIG.  58 — Progressive  Elevation  of  Beaches  Northward,  -         -   107 

FIG.  59 — A  Map  of  Lake  Souris,  113 

FIG.  60 — Sand  Dunes  Burying  Forest,   -         -  -  118 

FIG.  6 1 — Section  of  Devils  and^Stump  Lakes,    -  -        126 

FIG.  62 — Map  of  Devils  and  Stump  Lakes,    -  -   127 

FIG.  63 — The  Tower  Quadrangle,        -  129 

FIG.  64 — Sheyenne  Valley,  --  130 

FIG.  65 — Section,  Sheyenne  Valley,  Valley  City,  132 

FIG.  66 — Section,  Sheyenne  Valley,  Valley  City,    -  -  132 

FIG.  67 — Terraces,  Sheyenne  Valley,  Valley  City,      -  133 

FIG.  68 — Sheyenne  Valley,  3^  Miles  South  of  Valley  City,  -  134 

FIG.  69 — Sheyenne  Valley.  7  Miles  South  of  Valley  City,  -  134 

FIG.  70 — Sheyenne  Valley,  10  Miles  South  of  Valley  City,  -  135 

FIG.  71 — Sheyenne  Valley  at  Daily,  ----  -136 

FIG.  72 — Sheyenne  Valley  at  Standing  Rock,                            -  -  136 

FIG.  73 — Sheyenne  Valley,  Under-Cut  Bank,     -  137 

FIG.  74 — Sheyenne  Valley  at  "The  Jaws,"     -  -  137 

FIG.  75— Sheyenne  Valley,  Lisbon  Cut-Off,        -  -        138 

FIG.  76 — Railroad. Cut,  Kathryn,  -  -  138 

FIG.  77 — An  Outlier  of  Shale,    -  -        139 

FIG.  78 — Sheyenne  Valley,  Fort  Ransom,  -   141 

FIG.  79 — Banks  of  Sheyenne,  Fargo,  -  141 
FIG.  80 — Glacial  Channels,  Maple  River,'       -                                               -    Opposite  142 

FIG.  81 — Section,  Glacial  Channel,    -  -        145 

F.IG.  82 — Section,  Maple  Valley,  -   145 

FIG.  83 — Glacial  Channel,  Oriska,  146 

FIG.  84— Glacial  Channel,  Tower  Tp.,    -  -   146 

FIG.  85 — Glacial  Channel,  Terraces,  -  147 

FIG.  86— Glacial  Maple,  Clinton  Tp.,  -   147 

FIG.  87 — Glacial  Maple,  at  Enderlin,  148 

FIG.  88 — Glacial  Maple,  Moore  Tp.,  -  148 

FIG.  89 — Photograph,  Maple  River,   -  149 

FIG.  90 — Glacial  Maple  near  Enderlin,   -  -   150 

FIG.  91 — A  Kame,      -         -  -        150 

FIG.  92 — Lakes  Top  of  Turtle  Mountain,  -  162 

.FiG.  93 — Map  of  Rush  Lake,      -         -  169 

FIG.  94 — A  Butte,  -  172 

FIG.  95 — Bad  Lands,  Williston,  175 

FIG.  96 — Clay  Butte,       -  -     -                  --_  --i?5 

FIG.  97 — Pyramid  Butte,   -         -  -         -         -        176 

FIG.  98— "Capped  Butte"  -  177 

FIG.  99 — Halting  at  the  Schack,         -  -        179 

FIG.  100 — Structure  of  the  Buttes,         -  -  180 
FIG.  101 — Masses  of  Scoria,        _____                  ____      '182 

FIG.  102 — Custer  Trail  Ranche,      -  -  183 

FIG.  103 — Bad  Lands,  Little  Missouri,        -         -  -        185 

FIG.  104 — "The  Palisades,"    -  -  185 
FIG.  105 — Coal  in  North  Dakota,        -                                                                  -         -        191 

FIG.  1 06 — Old  Sim's  Mine,      ------  -192 

FIG.  107 — Out  Cropping  Coal,    -  -        196 

FIG.  108 — Mouse  River  Lignite  Coal  Mine,     -  -  198 

FIG.  109 — Section,  Lignite  Coal  Mine,        -         -  199 

FIG.  no — Section,  Lehigh  Mines,  -         -         -                                               -  200 

FIG.  in — Section  of  North  Dakota,  -         -  -        202 

FIG.  T.T.2 — Cretaceous  Era  in  North  America,  -  205 


10  A    LIST    OF    THE   ILLUSTRATIONS. 

PAGE 

FIG.  113 — Section,  Artesian  Well,  Grafton,   '     -  •     .-.;     -        -  -        -                 208 

FIG.  114 — Section,  Missouri  Plateau,      -  -  212 

FIG.  115 — Extent  of  Glaciation  in  United  States,       -        -        -  ,        -     •    -       215 

FIG.  116 — Morainic  Lake, -        -         -  .-...-         -  219 

FIG.  117 — A  Stony  Ridge,  -        -        -         -        -        -         -    •.•*:•  v-"- '•  -        -.      220 

FIG.  118 — In  the  Coteaus,       -         -         -         -         -         -         -         -  -        -         -  221 

FIG.  119 — A  Land  Mark,    -  -       222 

FIG.  120 — Douglas  Valley,     -  -  223 

FIG.  i2i— Glacial  Drainage,        --_ 226 

FIG.  122 — Map  of  Missouri  Plateau,       -- --  228 

FIG.  123 — West  Rainy  Butte,    -  -        232 

FIG.  124 — East  Rainy  Butte,  -  233 

FIG.  125 — Alkali  Lake,       -  -       234 

FIG.  126 — Where  the  Bad  Lands  Begin,  -  237 

FIG.  127 — Border  of  the  Bad  Lands,  233 

FIG.  128— Crown  Butte,  -  239 

FIG.  129 — Buttes  near  Williston,        -  240 

FIG.  130— Sentinel  Butte,       -  -  241 

FIG.  131 — Cross-bedded  Structure,     -        -  242 

FIG.  132 — The  Great  Stone  Face,  -  -  243 

FIG.  133 — A  Ranch  Home,  246 

FIG.  134— Cuskelly  Ranch, -  248 

FIG.  135 — Jack  Williams'  Ranch,       -  -       -251 

FIG.  136— Cherry  Creek,  -254 

FIG.  137 — Section,  Artesian  Wells      -  259 

FIG.  138 — Artesian  Section,  Devils  Lake  Southward,    -  -  261 

FIG.  139 — Section,  Fresh  Artesian  Wells,  -  -   .                       263 

FIG.  140 — Flowing  Well,  Red  River  Valley,  -  -  264 

FIG.  141 — Flowing  Well,  Mooreton,    -  -        264 

FIG.  142 — Flowing  Well,  Chaffee  Farm,  -  265 

FIG.  143 — Flowing  Well,  Woods,  Cass  County,  -  265 

FIG.  144 — Sources  of  Artesian  Water  at  Grandin,           -        -        -  -        -        -266 

FIG.  145— Just  Struck  Water,     -  -        268 
FIG.  146 — Machinery  Buried  by  Eruptive  Well,    - 

FIG.  147 — Sandstone-capped  Butte,  -  272 

FIG.  148— Clay  Butte,    -----  -  273 

FIG.  149 — Muskrat  House,  274 

FIG.  150 — Camp  of  Soil  Party, 

FIG.  151 — Sun  Cracks,  Missouri  River,       -         -         -         -         -  -         -         -279 

FIG.  152 — Wind-Blown  Sand, 

FIG.  153 — Four  Sisters,  Holding  Claims,    -  281 

FIG.  154— The  Four  Claims,    -  -  282 

FIG.  155 — First  Occupant  of  the  Soil,         -  287 

FIG.  156 — Sandstone  Concretions,  -         -         -  -  295 

FIG.  157 — School  House  of  Petrified  Wood,        -------        299 

FIG.  i57a — An  Agatized  Stump,    -  -  301 

FIG.  158 — Eastern  Farm  in  Small  Fields, 3°4 

FIG.  159 — "Pictured  Rock,"  Fort  Ransom, -  3°5 

FIG.  1 60 — The  Last  of  Fort  Abercrombie,          -------       305 

FIG.  j6i — The  Pioneers.     (Sod  House),  -  3°6 

FIG.  162 — Stock  Farm,  Red  River  Valley,  3°6 

FIG.  163 — North  Dakota  Farm  in  One  Big  Field,  -         -         -         -  -         -         -3° 7 

FIG.  164 — Ten  Feet  of  Coal  in  Banks  of  Missouri  River,  -  3°9 

FIG.  165 — Freeman's  Ranch,  -  311 

FIG.  1 66 — Russian  Home,  -         -         -         -         -         -         -         -  -         -         -311 

FIG.  167— Soil  Map  of  North  Dakota,    -  In  Pocket 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  PRAIRIES. 

CHAPTER  THE  FIRST. 

THE  LANDSCAPE.  /'„    V 

INTRODUCTION. 

How  many  of  the  readers  of  this  book  understand  what  is  meant  by 
the  words  Landscape  Geology?  Every  one  has  seen  a  landscape,  but 
we  often  hear  people  speak  about  Geology  as  though  that  meant  rocks 
and  stones  and  minerals  and  was  therefore  hard  and  dry.  It  is  true 
that  Geology  deals  with  rocks  and  stones  and  minerals,  among  other 
things,  and  sometimes  it  is  hard  and  dry.  But  Arithmetic  and  Gram- 
mar are  sometimes  "hard  and  dry"  also.  It  may  not  always  be  the 
fault  of  the  subject  that  it  is  uninteresting.  The  trouble  may  be  in  the 
way  it  is  studied. 

When  the  author  was  a  boy  and  sat  upon  a  hard,  old-fashioned 
wooden  bench  in  a  little  country  schoolhouse  between  the  hills,  in  the 
state  of  New  York,  he  used  to  think  the  reading  lessons  were  pretty 
"hard  and  dry."  Since  he  has  become  older,  however,  he  has  come  to 
think  that  the  fault  was  not  in  the  subject,  for  he  now  finds  these  same 
speeches  of  Webster  and  Clay  and  Washington,  and  selections  from 
Irving  and  Lowell  and  Emerson,  very  interesting.  The  trouble  seems 
to  have  been  in  the  way  he  studied  them.  He  did  not  see  the  beauty 
in  them.  He  saw  big  words  hard  to  pronounce  and  harder  to  spell,  and 
punctuation  marks,  at  which  he  must  stop,  put  in  between  the  words! 
When  he  read  it  was  to  pronounce  the  words  and  mind  the  pauses ! 

The  trouble  was  not  with  the  lessons,  for  they  were  beautiful  and 
grand.  The  trouble  was  not  entirely  with  the  boy,  for  he  tried  to  do 
what  he  was  told  to  do.  Perhaps  the  fault  was  not  altogether  that  of 
the  teacher,  for  she  did  not  know  any  better ! 

If  after  the  reader  has  studied  this  book  he  finds  Geology  "hard  and 
dry"  the  trouble  will  certainly  not  be  with  the  subject,  and  probably  not 


12  THE   STORY   OF  THE   PRAIRIES. 

with  the  reader.  If  the  author  has  not  made  the  landscape,  the  fields, 
the  roadside,  the  school  grounds,  the  river  and  the  lake,  more  interesting 
because  we  have  come  to  know  more  about  them  and  to  see  something 
more  than  mere  rocks  and  stones,  sand  and  water,  then  it  is  his  fault 
and  not  that  of  the  subject. 

In  geography  we  sometimes  think  of  the  things  we  are  studying 

about  as  far  away,  in  some  other  state,  or  in  some  other  country,  the 

features  of  some  landscape  somewhere,  but  we,  may  be,  do  not  realize 

that  it  means  par  State,  our  neighborhood,  our  school  grounds,  our  door- 

•  yard.    V  ; :«'  ;  *..f 

t  .  t,  ,cQne 'who,  kftpws  Botany  sees  a  good  deal  more  in  the  fields  than 
:  \:  rgSriss^  and  'grain,1  weeds,  trees  and  bushes.  The  psychologist  says  he 
"apperceives"  more.  We  do  not  wish  to  talk  about  apperception  now,  at 
least  we  do  not  wish  to  call  it  by  that  name,  but  we  wrish  to  talk  about 
some  things  which,  may  be,  we  have  not  seen  in  the  fields  round  about  us, 
in  our  own  State,  our  own  neighborhood,  and  so  perhaps  come  to  see 
the  great  beautiful  world  in  a  larger  and  fuller  sense,  and  may  be  to  a 
larger  realization  of  what  is  ours  to  enjoy. 

Just  as  the  botanist  sees  more  than  grass  and  weeds  and  trees  in 
the  fields,  so  may  we  all  see  more  than  soil  in  the  ploughed  fields,  more 
than  a  hindrance  to  farming  in  the  stones  in  the  fields,  more  than  poor 
land  in  the  hilly  farm,  more  than  a  misfortune  in  the  rugged  coulee 
which  cuts  into  the  level  prairie  wheatfield,  more  than  a  hay-meadow 
in  the  level  marsh,  more  than  wheat  in  the  waving  billowy  sea  of  grain, 
more  than  a  useless  waste  in  the  boggy  slough,  more  than  a  worthless 
waste  in  the  sandy  tract  of  dunes  upon  which  barely  a  vestige  of  any- 
thing green  exists.  There 'is  a  grand  and  beautiful  meaning  in  all  the 
varied  landscape  of  our  State  if  we  can  but  read  Nature's  story  book. 
In  these  pages  the  author  has  tried  to  make  readable  a  few  of  the 
paragraphs  of  this  great  book,  paragraphs  which  are  not  too  commonly 
read  and  not  too  fully  enjoyed  by  the  average  of  human  kind. 

Have  you  ever  wondered  why  the  prairies  are  prairie  and  the  hills 
are  hilly?  Or  have  you,  may  be,  thought  about  it  and  said  to  yourself 
that  you  supposed  God  made  the  prairies  and  hills  because  He  saw  fit 
to  do  so,  and  made  some  parts  of  the  world  hilly  and  some  parts  level 
because  in  His  great  wisdom  it  pleased  Him  to  so  arrange  things?  This 
may  enable  you  to  satisfy  your  wondering  curiosity,  but  a  little  thinking 
will  enable  you  to  see  that,  while  God  in  very  truth  made  the  hills  and 
the  prairies  and  made  some  parts  of  the  world  different  from  other  parts, 


THE   LANDSCAPE.  13 

nevertheless  this  does  not  answer  the  question  why  things  are  as  they 
are ;  for  this  great  universe  which  an  All-wise  Creator  made  and  which 
He  rules  is  governed  by  laws  in  accordance  with  which  the  prairies  and 
the  hills  have  been  formed,  the  water  and  the  dry  lands  have  assumed 
their  places,  the  rivers  and  the  lakes  have  established  themselves,  and  the 
face  of  all  the  landscape  has  been  fashioned. 

Hills  and  Valleys. — Every  one  who  reads  these  pages  has  seen  a  val- 
ley, and  also  what  might  be  called  hills.  Maybe  the  valley  was  only  a 
ditch  or  small  coulee  on  the  prairie  and  the  hills  only  little  banks  one  or 
two  feet  high.  But  the  importance  of  things  is  not  always  measured  by 
their  size.  Maybe  you  have  been  in  those  parts  of  our  State,  or  some 
other  state,  where  there  are  great  rugged  hills  and  broad,  deep  valleys. 
Whoever  has  seen  hills  has  also  seen  valleys.  Have  you  ever  thought 
that  there  might  be  a  necessary  relation  between  the  hills  and  the  val- 
leys? Perhaps  you  have  been  accustomed  to  thinking  of  the  earth  as 
"made"  in  the  beginning  with  oceans  and  continents  and  mountains, 
with  plains  and  rivers  of  water  flowing  through  them,  and  have  never 
questioned  but  that  these  have  always  bee/i  so.  But  a  little  observation 
and  reflection  at  once  teaches  that  this  is  not  so,  for  you  have  not  failed 
to  see  that  the  river  is  constantly  changing  the  land, — a  little  soil  is 
being  washed  into  the  valley  from  the  banks  along  its  sides  with  every 
rain  and  this  is  carried  down  the  stream.  All  streams  transport  mate- 
rials by  carrying  them  or  shoving  and  rolling  them  along  their  bottoms. 

Perhaps  you  have  watched  the  sand  and  pebbles  creeping  down 
stream  on  a  gravelly  bottom,  and  wondered  how  long  this  process  has 
been  going  on,  and  when  it  was  that  soil  and  sand  began  to  be  carried 
down  stream.  And  then  perhaps  you  wondered  if  the  stream  would 
ever  stop  carrying  away  the  soil  and  sand  toward  the  ocean.  By  and  by 
you  began  to  think  that  this  carrying  away  process  must  have  begun  as 
soon  as  there  was  any  land  on  which  rain  fell ;  and  so  also  you  concluded 
that  this  constant  wearing  away  of  the  land,  called  erosion,  will  keep 
on  as  long  as  there  is  any  land  left  above  the  level  of  the  sea.  It  occurs 
to  you  that  likely  this  has  been  going  on  ever  since  the  beginning  of 
things  and  you  perhaps  begin  to  wonder  if  the  land  will  not  all  be  car- 
ried away  in  time  and  you  wonder  if  there  has  not  been  more  land  here 
sometime  which  has  been  carried  away.  When  you  think  -that  "the 
beginning"  was  a  good  while  ago  you  are  forced  to>  conclude  that  a 
good  deal  of  land  has  been  carried  away.  And  when  you  think  that 
the  land  which  is  nearest  the  rivers  is  the  first  to  be  carried  away,  and 


14 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  PRAIRIES. 


How  the  Farm  is  Lost. 


How  the  Farm  is  Regained. 


How  the  Farm  is  Retained. 

FIG.  2.    Showing  the  Erosion  of  Young  Valleys  on  a  Hilly  Landscape. 
Photographed  from  a  C/iart,  by  Prof.  E.  S.  Keene. 


THE   LANDSCAPE.  15 

that  the  hills  and  higher  lands  are  but  the  parts  which  are  farther 
away  and  have  not  yet  been  carried  away,  you  see  that  the  river  or 
running  stream  is  the  agent  which  is  doing  the  work  of  carving  and 
fashioning  the  landscape. 

The  river  is  water  seeking  its  level.  The  rains  loosen  the  soil  on 
the  banks  of  streams  so<  that  it,  too,  seeks  a  lower  level,  or  falls.  The 
energy  of  the  sun  causes  water  to  evaporate  and  rise  as  vapor.  This 
forms  the  clouds,  and  the  clouds  are  blown  by  the  winds  and  carried 
over  the  land.  Then  they  fall  as  rain  and  again  form  rivers.  Then 
the  rivers,  as  we  have  seen,  flow  off  the  land  and  carry  with  them  the 
soil  or  fine  parts  of  the  earth,  the  materials  of  which  the  hills'are  made. 
So  long  as  the  sun  furnishes  heat  the  waters  will  be  evaporated,  and 
clouds  will  be  formed,  and  rains  will  fall  upon  the  earth,  and  rivers 
will  flow  into  the  seas.  And  so  the  endless  cycle  goes  on,  has  been 
going  on  through  the  long  aeons  of  the  past,  and  will  continue  to  go  on 
through  the  lapse  of  ages  to  come.  And  so  the  continents  are  being 
gradually  worn  down  and  carried  into  the  seas.  The  "everlasting 
hills"  are  not  everlasting.  They  tarry  but  a  day  when  time  is  meas- 
ured in  geologic  cycles.  In  truth,  "one  day  is  with  the  Creator  as  a 
thousand  years,  and  a  thousand  years  as  one  day."  The  little  rivulet 
which  runs  by  the  school-house  playground  or  along  the  roadside  is 
doing  the  same  kind  of  work  in  carrying  away  the  land  to  the  ocean 
as  the  river,  only  on  a  smaller  scale.  But  it  is  only  a  question  of  time 
till  the  level  prairies  will  give  way  to  the  hilly  landscape,  and  finally 
the  hills  will  yield  to  the  constant  wearing  of  the  streams.  When  the 
landscape  has  been  thus  worn  away  so  that  the  land  is  but  little 
higher  than  the  ocean-level  then  it  is  said  to  have  reached  its  base- 
.level  of  erosion. 

Beginnings  of  a  Landscape. — If  a  new  continent  were  imagined  to 
arise  out  of  the  ocean,  upon  which  were  no  rivers,  no  valleys  or  hills, 
its  surface  sloping  uniformly  to  the  sea,  how  would  rivers  get  started? 
It  must  be  that  they  would  form  in  some  way,  for  there  are  rivers  or 
streams  on  all  continents  where  rain  falls.  Children  have  been  taught 
sometimes  (let  us  hope  not  in  the  schools  of  our  own  State)  that  rivers 
were  established-  in  their  courses  by  a  gathering  of  waters  in  the  in- 
terior of  the  continent  and  that  this  water  .flowed  across  the  land  wher- 
ever it  could  go  most  easily,  and  in  so  doing  cut  a  channel  and  became 
established  in  a  definite  course.  Now,  all  the  water  there  is  on  the 
land  in  lakes  or  streams  or  in  the  soil  comes  from  the  rain  which  falls 


16 


THE   STORY   OF  THE   PRAIRIES. 


upon  the  land.  A  large  part  of  the  rain-water  percolates  into  the  soil 
and  rocks  of  the  earth.  Some  of  it  collects  in  low  places  and  forms 
lakes,  pools,  and  marshes.  From  these  a  good  deal  evaporates  and 
goes  into  the  air  to  form  clouds  again. 

Now,  where  will  a  river  have  its  beginning?  Where  will  a  definite 
stream  channel  first  appear?  Will  it  start  from  the  interior  and  flow 
toward  the  sea?  What  will  start  it?  Does  any  more  water  fall  on  the 
land  in  the  interior  than  nearer  the  sea?  Since  the  land  is  higher  than 
the  sea,  the  land  waters  will  tend  to  move  toward  the  sea.  Where  are 
the  waters  which  will  reach  the  sea  first?  It  is  plain,  the  waters  nearest 
the  sea.  *  And  since  moving  water  always  cuts  a  channel,  or  erodes 
the  land  over  which  it  flows,  the  first  soil  to  be  carried  to  the  ocean  and 
deposited  on  its  bottom  as  sediment  will  be  the  soil  which  was  at  the 
margin,  or  edge  of  the  land,  and  the  beginning  of  a  channel  or  valley 
will  be  at  the  edge  of  the  land.  The  next  water  to  get  to  the  sea  will 
be  that  which  fell  on  the  land  near  to  the  edge  but  a  little  farther  inland. 
Then  that  from  a  little  farther  inland  still,  and  so  on,  till  finally  the 
water  from  the  interior  will  get  down  to  the  shore. 

But  where  now  has  the  valley  been  cut  most?  Where  is  the  largest 
part  of  the  river?  Where  did  the  river  begin? 

If  we  indicate  a  series  of  small  areas  extending  from  the  sea-shore 
toward  the  inland  by  the  letters  a,  b,  c,  d,  e,  f,  g,  h,  the  waters  which 
fall  upon  a  will  be  the.  first  to  reach  the  sea ;  those  which  fall  upon  b  will 


FIG.  3.    Diagram  showing  how  a  Valley  begins  at  its  own  Mouth. 


be  next,  taking  advantage  in  their  course  of  the  channel  made  by 
the  waters  of  a;  those  falling  upon  c  will  be  the  next,  and  these  will 
go  down  by  the  channel  made  by  a  and  b;  and  d  will  in  turn  reach  the 
sea  coursing  down  the  channel  made  by  a,  b  and  c,  making  the  channel 
deeper  and  wider  by  erosion;  and  at  length  e,  f,  g  and  h  will  reach 
the  sea. 

Let  us  now  compare  one  part  of  the  valley  with  another  from  a  to 


THE   LANDSCAPE. 


17 


//..  How  do  the  amounts  of  water  which  have  gone  over  each  area 
compare?  Suppose  we  say  the  water  which  falls  upon  one  area  is 
one  volume.  Then  if  the  whole  length  of  the  valley  is  the  distance 
from  a  to  h,  and  if  we  suppose  all  the  water  which  falls  on  each  area 
to  go  down  the  valley,  the  water  which  passes  over  a  will  be  seven 
times  as  much  as  passes  over  g,  that  which  passes  over  b  will  be  six 
times  as  much  as  passes  over  g,  five  times  as  much  over  c  as  over  g, 
and  so  on,  while  from  h  will  pass  only  the  water  which  falls  upon 
that  area. 

Where  there  is  the  most  water,  other  things  being  equal,  there  is 
the  greatest  erosion.  Where  then  has  the  greatest  channel  been 
formed?  And  where  is  the  river  largest?  And  finally,  where  does 
the  valley  of  a  river  begin,  in  the  interior  of  the  continent  or  at  its  own 
mouth  ? 

Let  us  now  think  of  the  series  of  areas,  a,  b,  c,  d,  etc.,  as  a  thousand, 
and  the  extent  of  each  area  to  be  large.  From  the  farthest  and  highest 
part  of  the  continent  the  waters  may  be  thought  of  as  a  long  time 
in  reaching  the  sea.  There  will  be  then  a  broad  and  deep  valley  nearer 
the  sea,  and  it  will  be  smaller  and  smaller  as  we  go  inland,  and  on  the 
thousandth  area,  or  the  summit  of  the  continent,  it  will  be  only  a 
place  where  rain  falls,  with  hardly  a  beginning  of  a  coulee. 

Let  us  now  go  out  upon  the  level  prairies  of  North  Dakota  and 
look  at  the  coulees  and  see  what  we  can  observe  of  the  workings  of  a 
river  system.  Let  us  see  if  we  can  find  any  examples  of  what  we  have 
just  been  studying.  If  we  select  a  day  when  it  has  been  raining  for 
some  time  so  that  the  land  is  well  covered  with  water,  we  shall  be  able 
to  see  in  reality  what  we  have  been  seeing  in  imagination.  Here  on 
the  prairie,  cutting  through  level  wheat  fields,  is  a  coulee,  a  little  valley 


FIG.  4.    Cross  Section  of  a  Young  Valley. 


18  THE   STORY   OF   THE   PRAIRIES. 

having  steep  sides,  growing  wider  down  stream  and  narrower  up 
stream,  its  sides  becoming  less  steep  towards  the  mouth  and  more  steep 
towards  its  head.  In  the  bottom  of  this  trough  or  notch  in  the  prairie 
trickles  a  tiny  stream.  Can  it  be  that  this  stream  has  carried  away 
the  earth  which  once  occupied  the  space  where  is  now  the  trough  or 
coulee?  Strewn  along  the  bottom  are  boulders,  sand  and  gravel,  the 
heavier  masses  which  could  not  so  easily  be  carried  away  by  the  waters 
and  which  were  in  the  soil  or  earth  which  has  been  carried  away.  If 
we  go  out  upon  the  land  some  distance  from  the  coulee  and  look  across 
it  we  shall  see  that  the  whole  trough  of  the  young  valley  is  below  the 


FIG.  5.    A  Cutting  Coulee,  or  Young  Valley.      Photograph  by  Prvf.  Chas,  M.  Hall, 

level  of  the  surrounding  country.  On  the  level  prairies  of  the  Red 
River  Valley  you  could  imagine  a  great  board  or  plank  to  extend 
across  from  the  prairie  on  one  side  to  the  prairie  on  the  other.  The 
Grand  Canyon  of  the  Colorado  River  is  but  a  great  coulee  cut  down  by 
the  river  deep  into  the  plain.  The  materials  of  which  the  great  Colo- 
rado plateau  is  made  are  of  such  kind  that  the  moving  waters  cut  it 
away  rapidly,  and  the  walls  on  either  side  are  steep  and  high.  Canyon  is 
another  name  for  a  young  valley. 

Let  us  now  go  along  the  bank  of  the  coulee  and  see  if  we  can  dis- 
cover how  the  valley  got  started.  All  about  upon  the  level  prairie 
we  see  water  standing  in  sheets  from  recent  heavy  rains.  If  we  ask 
ourselves  if  the  prairie  will  by  and  by  be  dry  again  we  shall  certainly 


THE   LANDSCAPE.  19 

answer  that  it  will,  for  it  has  often  been  very  wet  before  and  has  become 
dry  again.  Where  did  the  water  go?  It  soaked  into  the  ground,  or 
a  part  of  it  did,  and  some  of  it  evaporated,  and  went  to  help  make 
clouds.  But  how7  about  the  water  which  was  near  by  the  edge  of  the 
coulee?  Some  of  it  fell  down  the  side  into  the  trough  carrying  with 
it  always  some  soil.  If  it  chanced  that  there  was  a  depression  or  lower 
place  in  the  prairie,  and  there  ahvays  are  such  places,  this  hollow  was 
filled  with  water,  and  if  the  low  place  is  so  near  the  coulee  that  its 
waters  break  over  the  edge  and  fall  down  the  side,  or  if  a  little  rivulet 
on  the  bank  of  the  coulee  should  cut  back  into  the  edge  of  the  little 
"lake"  and  tap  it,  then  its  water  would  be  drained.  But  in  falling  down 
the  side  of  the  coulee  the  water  cuts  a  little  channel,  and  when  it  rains 
again  the  water  which  falls  in  this  hollow,  or  lake,  will  run  into  the 
valley  through  the  little  channel  formed  before,  cutting  this  deeper. 
If  this  depression  were  a  large  one  the  little  channel  would  become 
a  feeder  to  the  larger  stream  which  made  the  valley,  and  it  would  then 
be  called  a  tributary  to  the  valley. 

If  we  go  down  the  course  of  the  coulee  to  see  where  it  ends  we 
shall  see  that  it  discharges  into  a  larger  stream,  or  maybe  runs  into  a 
lake.  If  it  joins  a  larger  stream  then  it  is  itself  a  tributary  to  the  larger 
stream. 

How  then  did  the  coulee  or  young  valley  get  started?  In  just  the 
same  way  as  the  branch  or  tributary,  for  the  coulee  is  only  a  branch  of 
a  larger  stream.  How  does  a  coulee  or  valley  increase  its  length?  If 
you  watch  a  little  rivulet  by  the  roadside  when  it  is  raining  hard  you 
will  see  that  the  head  of  the  little  stream  pushes  back  toward  the  land 
as  the  water  from  the  land  falls  over  into  the  little  valley.  In  fact  it 
grows  longer  in  just  the  same  way  as  it  got  started  in  the  first  place, 
by  water  falling  from  a  higher  to  a  lower  level  and  carrying  the  soil 
along  with  it. 


CHAPTER  THE  SECOND. 
EXCURSIONS   AFIELD 

A  Few  Comparisons. — North  Dakota  is  one  of  the  "prairie  states." 
Yet  those  who  have  seen  the  various  parts  of  the  State  often  speak 
of  the  "hills"  in  any  place  as  though  North  Dakota  could  be  said  to 
have  real  hills!  Compared  with  Pennsylvania  or  New  York  or  Ver- 
mont the  "hills"  of  North  Dakota  are  hardly  more  than  knolls.  When 
eastern  people  think  of  a  North  Dakota  landscape  they  often  think  of 
broacl-reaching  prairies  limited  to  the  view  only  by  the  distance  the 
eye  can  reach.  North  Dakotans  will  make  no  serious  objection  to 
such  opinions  being  held,  especially  when  the  rugged  hilly  character 
of  many  eastern  landscapes  is  considered.  And  even  if  it  be  contended 
that  in  the  east  they  can  almost  "work  the  land  on  both  sides"  because 
the  surface  appears  to  be  turned  up  on  edge,  yet  we  are  satisfied  to  answer 


FIG.  6.     In  the  East  they  work  the  land  on  both  sides'. 

Photograph  by  McCormick  Harvesting  Machine  Co. 

20 


EXCURSIONS  AFIELD. 


21 


FIG.  7.     In  North  Dakota  enough  can  be  raised  on  one  side! 
Photograph  by  McCormick  Harvesting  Machine  Co. 

that  we  can  raise  more  on  the  one  side  of  our  prairies  than  can  be  raised 
in  the  states  named  on  two  sides. 

But  those  who  know  the  geography  of  North  Dakota  know  that 
the  whole  story  has  not  been  told  when  it  is  said  that  ours  is  a  prairie 
state..  There  are  prairies  and  prairies!  Level  prairies  and  rolling 
prairies.  And  sometimes  the  "rolling"  is  so  marked  that  we  may  ven- 
ture to  speak  of  it  as  "hilly." 

Compare  the  floor-like  level  about  Fargo  or  Grand  Forks,  Cassel- 
ton  or  Grafton,  or  any  part  of  the  Red  River  Valley;  the  rolling-prairie 
country  about  Langdon  or  Devils  Lake,  Oakes  or  Ellendale;  the 
rugged  and  unploughed  hills  between  Hope  and  Valley  City,  or  the 
picturesque  "curves"  of  the  landscape  along  the  Sheyenne  River  in 
Foster  county;  the  billowy  ups  and  downs  on  the  Coteaus  of  the  Mis- 
souri west  of  Minot;  the  steep  and  bouldery  landscape  south  of  Dog 
Den  Butte  in  McLean  County ;  the  broken-prairie  country  about  Dick- 
inson known  as  the  "breaks;"  the  ragged  and  rock-ribbed  hills,  known 
as  "buttes,"  in  the  valley  of  the  Little  Missouri.  We  shall  see  that 
while  North  Dakota  is  a  prairie  state  yet  she  has  much  diversity  of 
surface. 

Again,  in  some  places  the  fields  are  very  stony,  in  others  hardly  a 
stone  can  be  found  over  great  areas.  And  not  only  this  but  the  stones 
are  mostly  rounded  and  smooth,  while  in  some  places  they  are  nearly 
all  angular  and  rough.  Some  of  the  lands  are  called  "light,"  having 
a  dry  sandy  soil  with  no  stones  larger  than  sand  grains,  and  some  are 
"heavy,"  with  a  clayey  soil,  often  with  large  stones  imbedded  in  the 
clay  or  on  the  surface.  And  still  again,  some  of  the  fields  are  black, 


22 


THE   STORY   OF  THE   PRAIRIES. 


with  a  deep  loamy  soil.  And  these  differences  often  occur  within 
short  distances.  One  who  has  ridden  over  the  Great  Northern  Rail- 
way westward  from  Larimore  may  have  observed  that  there  is  an 
abrupt  change  from  the  level  prairie  east  of  Larimore  to  the  "hilly" 
prairie  to  the  west.  The  same  kind  of  a  change,  though  not  nearly  as 
great,  occurs  four  miles  west  of  Wheatland  on  the  Northern  Pacific 


BROKEN. 
FIG.  8.    Three  Types  of  Landscape. 

line,  wh'ere  that  road  rises  off  from  the  level  Red  River  Valley  onto 
the  highland  to  the  west. 

East  of  the  city  of  Devils  Lake  the  prairie  swells  and  rolls  in  grace- 
ful undulations.  Go  across  the  lake  and  the  landscape  becomes  very 
hilly,  and  often  the  hillsides  are  strewn  with  large  boulders.  From 
Towner  to  Minot  the  country  is  gently  uneven  prairie.  West  of 
Minot  there  is  a  sudden  change  to  a  high  plateau  with  an  uneven  and 
hilly  surface.  Along  the  Goose  River  east  of  Mayville  the  fields  are 
almost  as  level  as  the  floor  of  the  school-house,  and  the  soil  is  black 


EXCURSIONS  AFIELD.  23 

and  when  wet  exceedingly  sticky.  Travel  west  toward  Sherbrooke 
and  it  will  be  observed  that  the  soil  becomes  sandy,  and  well  defined 
sand-ridges  run  north  and  south.  About  Sherbrooke  the  hills  are 
sharply  rolling  and  the  soil  is  less  black. 

In  many  parts  of  the  State  fields  free  from  stones  and  those  which 
are  very  stony  are  intermingled.  And  it  is  noticeable  that  the  stones 
are  nearly  all  rounded  and  smoothed.  Cross  the  Missouri  River  how- 
ever in  the  western  part  of  the  State  and  the  hills  are  seen  to  be  different 
in  shape.  Here  they  are  flat  on  top  with  trough-like  valleys  between 
them  very  different  from  the  rounded  hollows  among  the  hills  on  the 
rolling  prairies,  and  the  "cobble-stones"  or  boulders,  which  are  so 
common  over  much  of  the  State,  soon  disappear  entirely  west  of  the 
Missouri  River. 

North  Dakota  has  level  and  rolling  prairies,  hills  and  hollows,  lakes 
and  marshes,  fields  very  stony  and  those  free  from  stones,  fertile  farm- 
ing lands  the  best  and  richest  in  the  world,  other  lands  more  valuable 
for  grazing  than  for  farming,  and  the  most  wonderful  "Bad  Lands," 
all  resulting  from  geologic  agencies.  They  are  not  so  by  accident  or 
chance.  They  are  geologic  facts.  Their  explanation  belongs  to  the 
science  of  Landscape  Geology. 

An  Excursion  Among  the  Boulders. — Everyone  has  noticed  boul- 
ders scattered  here  and  there  over  the  prairies, — big  boulders  some- 
times weighing  several  tons  and  smaller  ones  of  all  sizes  down  to 
"cobbles"  weighing  a  few  ounces,  and  pebbles  of  the  size  of  marbles, 
and  finally  gravel  and  fine  sand.  A  little  study  of  the  soil  will  show 
that  it  also  is  made  up  largely  of  tiny  particles  or  grains  of  sand  which 
are  boulders  reduced  to  small  size.  And  the  familiar  clay  which  is  so 
common  a  feature  of  the  soil  a  little  below  the  surface  is  but  the  still 
finer  particles  of  broken  rocks  so  finely  ground  or  pulverized  as  to 
make  the  separate  particles  not  able  to  be  seen  without  the  aid  of  a 
microscope.  Boulders  are  seen  scattered  sometimes  in  groups  or 
patches,  sometimes  a  single  one  with  no  others  near,  and  big  and  little 
are  mingled  in  great  confusion.  Sometimes  a  sand  pit  is  seen  in  which 
the  sand  is  arranged  nicely  in  layers;  and  occasionally  a  stray  boulder 
is  found  in  the  sand,  sometimes  many  of  them.  It  has  also  been  no- 
ticed that  the  boulders  are  very  unlike  in  kind.  Some  of  them  when 
broken  look  very  much  like  broken  glass,  often  having  a  milky  gray 
appearance.  These  are  called  quartz,  or  quartzite  boulders.  They  are 
among  the  hardest  of  all  the  rocks  commonly  found  in  the  fields  or 


24  THE   STORY   OF   THE   PRAIRIES. 

in  quarries.  It  is  the  same  kind  of  rock  as  that  from  which  window 
glass  is  made.  It  is  so  hard  that  a  freshly  broken  piece  of  it  will  readily 
cut  or  mark  window  glass.  A  steel  knife  blade  will  leave  a  black  mark 
like  a  pencil  mark  on  it.  By  remembering  these  things  you  can  easily 
tell  which  are  the  quartz  boulders  in  the  field. 

Another  kind  which  is  likely  to  be  found  in  any  group  of  boulders 
is  one  which  when  broken  will  show  a  rough  surface  with  little  blocks 
having  a  somewhat  cubical  shape,  and  colored  pinkish  or  reddish, 
though  sometimes  white,  and  often  flesh-colored.  The  surfaces  of 
these  little  cubes  are  smooth  and  shiny,  and  reflect  the  sunlight  so  that 
they  look  very  bright.  These  little  blocks  or  crystals,  for  they  are 
really  crystals,  are  a  mineral  called  feldspar.  They  may  be  so  small 
as  not  to  be  easily  distinguished,  and  sometimes  the  little  shiny  faces 
are  one  or  two  inches  across.  Mixed  with  these  feldspar  crystals  may 
be  seen  little  black  specks  or  plates.  These  also  vary  much  in  size. 
When  they  are  large  enough  they  may  be  easily  split  with  the  point  of  a 
knife  into  thin  scales.  This  mineral  is  soft  and  can  be  cut  or  scratched 
with  a  knife  point.  These  are  crystals  of  mica,  and  when  they  occur 
in  large  plates  are  cut  up  and  split  apart  into  thin  pieces  and  used  in 
coal  stoves.  The  micas  used  in  coal  stoves  are  simply  pieces  cut  out 
of  very  large  crystals.  The  mica  crystals  seen  in  boulders  are  some- 
times black,  sometimes  clear,  sometimes  brown,  and  sometimes  green- 
ish. But  they  are  always  soft  and  can  always  be  split  into  thin  scales. 
A  third  mineral  which  is  always  present  in  the  kind  of  boulder  we  are 
now  describing  is  quartz,  the  same  quartz  as  has  been  before  spoken  of 
as  making  up  some  whole  boulders.  It  has  somewhat  the  appearance 
of  broken  pieces  of  glass,  scattered  through  the  rock  among  the  feld- 
spar and  mica  crystals.  These  particles  of  quartz  are  sometimes  hard 
to  distinguish  from  feldspar,  but  the  faces  of  the  little  blocks  are  never 
shiny  like  those  of  feldspar,  and  it  is  never  in  little  square  blocks  like 
feldspar.  Then  it  may  be  remembered  that  quartz  is  very  hard.  Feld- 
spar is  hard,  but  not  as  hard  as  quartz. 

These  three  minerals,  feldspar,  mica  and  quartz,  make  up  the  rock 
called  granite,  and  these  boulders  are  granite  boulders,  the  same  kind 
of  granite  as  is  used  for  making  tombstones  and  for  building  purposes. 
It  is  a  very  hard  rock  and  is  not  easily  broken.  The  action  of  frost 
and  sun  has  little  effect  upon  it,  and  it  also  takes  a  fine  polish.  These 
things  make  it  very  valuable  for  monuments  and  building  purposes.  A 
fourth  mineral  called  hornblende  is  often  found  in  connection  with  the 


EXCURSIONS  AFIELD.  25 

three  named,  and  this  is  somewhat  like  mica  in  appearance.  It  is, 
however,  harder  than  mica  and  does  not  split  into  thin  scales  so  easily 
as  mica  and  it  is  generally  in  thicker  masses,  and  is  usually  green  or 
greenish-black  in  color. 

These  two  kinds  of  boulders,  quartzites  and  granites,  are  among 
the  most  common.  These  are  the  more  familiar  "hard-heads"  which 
everyone  has  observed.  Besides  these,  however,  there  are  others 
which  when  broken  do  not  present  the  glassy,  milky  or  grayish  appear- 
ance of  the  quartzites  nor  the  flesh-colored,  red,  brown  or  specked 
appearance  of  the  granites.  Limestone  boulders  are  common  in  North 
Dakota,  and  in  most  of  the  northwestern  states.  These  can  be  known, 
however,  by  their  softer  character,  and  usually  by  being  more  affected 
by  the  action  of  sun  and  frost.  They  dissolve  and  crumble  much  more 
readily  than  the  others.  A  good  deal  of  the  soil  of  North  Dakota  is 
made  of  ground-up  limestone,  and  as  we  shall  see  by  and  by  this  ma- 
terial has  helped  to  make  our  rich  wheat-fields  and  also  to  make  our 
wells  furnish  hard  water. 

Still  other  boulders  there  are  which  have  long  hard  names  which 
we  do  not  need  to  describe  here  in  particular,  but  only  to  say  that 
there  are  a  good  many  others  and  nearly  all  of  them  are  made  of  hard 
materials  so  that  they  do  not  easily  crumble  or  break.  This  fact  of 
their  being  hard  is  important,  for  we  shall  see  later  that  this  helps  to 
explain  why  they  are  here.  They  have  not  been  broken  up  or  dis- 
solved, because  they  were  so  hard.  But  a  fact  that  we  should  notice 
here  is  that  these  different  kinds  are  found  scattered  almost  all  over 
our  State  and  over  other  northern  states  as  well;  limestone,  granites, 
quartzites,  hornblendes,  augites,  cherts  and  many  others,  large,  small, 
and  all  sizes,  mixed,  and  scattered  singly  and  in  patches,  sometimes 
almost  covering  the  ground  and  sometimes  few  and  far  apart,  on  the 
surface  and  deep  in  the  soil  below  the  surface. 

This  great  variety  in  kinds,  in  sizes  and  in  the  way  they  are  scat- 
tered leads  us  to  inquire  how  this  has  all  come  about,  where  have  the 
stones  come  from  and  why  are  they  so  different  in  kind  and  size,  and 
so  curiously  scattered?  Why  are  huge  boulders  sometimes  found  on 
.the  tops  of  the  hills  as  well  as  in  the  valleys?  And  again  sometimes 
not  even  a  good-sized  pebble  can  be  found  for  miles.  Then  again  it 
is  all  sand  for  miles,  suddenly  changing  to  black  sticky  prairie. 

It  has  not  required  any  great  skill  in  guessing  to  surmise  that  these 
rocks,  these  huge  boulders  and  the  great  quantities  of  sand,  were  not 


26  THE   STORY   OF   THE   PRAIRIES. 

"made"  in  North  Dakota,  that  is,  that  they  did  not  in  the  first  place 
belong  here,  but  have  been  brought  here  by  some  means  from  some- 
where else.  These  rocks  are  not  like  any  of  the  rocks  in  the  quarries 
of  the  State,  and  then  too  these  boulders,  pebbles  and  gravel,  and  even 
the  sand  grains  are  all  rounded  more  or  less,  while  the  rocks  from  our 
quarries  or  from  ledges  along  the  streams  where  the  bed-rock  comes 
to  the  surface,  are  all  rough  and  angular.  To  explain  how  these  things 
have  come  about  a  geological  story  will  have  to<  be  told,  a  little  frag- 
ment of  the  earth's  history,  of  the  manner  in  which  a  great  change  took 
place  over  a  large  part  of  North  America,  and  which  includes  most 
of  the  State  of  North  Dakota,  all  of  that  part  in  fact  which  lies  east 
of  the  Missouri  River.  A  part  of  this  story  will  be  told  in  the  next 
few  chapters. 

An  Excursion  to  Some  Quarries. — Just  as  it  is  necessary  for  us  to  see, 
feel,  smell,  taste  and  hear  in  order  to  think  about  an  object,  so  it  is 
necessary  for  us  to  see,  handle,  break,  dig  and  walk  over  the  fields, 
rocks,  soils,  hills  and  valleys  in  order  to  understand  the  geography  of 
our  own  neighborhood  or  State.  But  all  parts  of  our  State  are  like  all 
other  parts  in  many  respects,  and  what  is  true  of  North  Dakota  is  in  a 
large  measure  true  of  other  states,  and  other  countries.  Since  we  can- 
not all  visit  all  parts  of  our  own  State,  and  still  fewer  can  visit  all  the 
states  or  all  the  countries,  let  us  first  study  our  own  neighborhood,  and 
then  from  this  we  may  be  able  to  understand  the  parts  we  cannot  visit 
from  what  those  say  who  have  seen  parts  we  have  not  seen.  He  is  a 
good  scientist  who  understands  thoroughly  his  own  neighborhood. 
Let  us  then  go  out  and  pick  up  a  basket  full  of  stones  from  the  fields 
and  roadsides.  Let  them  be  collected  from  all  parts  of  the  neighbor- 
hood, and  let  big  and  little  and  all  kinds  be  gathered.  If  there  is  a 
patch  of  boulders  in  the  neighborhood  which  are  too  large  to  be  moved 
look  carefully  at  them  where  they  are.  In  the  collection  which  we 
have  made  we  have  perhaps  one  hundred,  maybe  two  or  three  hundred, 
"specimens,"  yes  specimens,  for  each  one  of  these  humble  stones  .has 
its  own  story  to  tell,  and  strange  as  it  may  seem  scarcely  any  two  of 
them  will  tell  the  same  story.  Can  you  find  two  which  are  exactly 
alike  in  shape  or  size?  Or,  what  is  more  wonderful,  can  you  find  two 
in  the  whole  collection  which  seem  to  be,  when  broken,  exactly  the 
same  kind  of  stone?  If  we  have  two  or  three  hundred  specimens  gath- 
ered from  about  the  neighborhood,  very  likely  if  you  try  to  sort  them, 
placing  them  in  piles  so  as  to  have  each  kind  by  itself,  meaning  by 


EXCURSIONS  AFIELD.  27 

kind  those  which  are  exactly  alike,  we  shall  have  a  hundred  or  more 
piles! 

Now  if  you  have  ever  been  in  a  stone  quarry  you  have  probably 
noticed  that  the  stones  which  were  being  taken  out  by  the  workmen 
were  all  very  much  alike.  If  the  ledge  in  which  the  quarry  is  located 
is  deep,  if  the  wall  of  rocks  is  high  and  you  see  many  layers  in  order 
you  may  have  noticed  that  they  are  not  all  alike,  but  if  you  look 
at  different  parts  of  the  same  layer,  following  it  from  one  part  of  the 
quarry  to  another,  you  notice  it  is  the  same  all  along.  The  different 
layers  may  also  be  very  much  alike.  You  see  no  such  differences  in 
these  layers,  or  strata  as  they  are  called,  as  you  saw  in  the  collection 
you  made  from  the  fields.  If  you  have  been  in  a  quarry  in  Minnesota 
or  Wisconsin  or  Iowa  it  may  have  been  a  limestone  quarry  you  saw. 
Among  the  specimens  you  collected  there  are  probably  several  lime- 
stone boulders.  These  you  will  observe  are  different  in  shape  from  the 
quarry  blocks.  The  boulders  are  all  rounded  and  smooth,  while  those 
freshly  broken  from  the  ledges  are  sharply  angular. 

If  you  have  been  in  eastern  South  Dakota  may  be  you  have  seen 
the  hard  reddish  building  stone  which  is  taken  from  the  extensive  quar- 
ries along  the  Big  Sioux  River  This  rock  is  of  quartzite,  the  same  min- 
eral as  has  been  spoken  of  as  making  some  of  the  "hard-head"  boulders. 
This  particular  region  of  South  Dakota  has  no  other  rocks  in  the  quar- 
ries. It  is  known  as  Sioux  quartzite  and  is  famous  as  a  building  stone. 
The  city  of  Sioux  Falls  gets  its  name  from  its  location  near  where  the 
Big  Sioux  River  crosses  an  outcropping  of  this  rock. 

Stone  quarries  are  very  scarce  in  North  Dakota,  for  reasons  which 
we  shall  see  a  little  later.  Let  us  look  again  to  our  sister  state  of  Min- 
nesota. At  Kasota,  near  Mankato,  are  large  quarries  where  the  splen- 
did reddish-brown  sandstone  is  obtained  which  is  used  for  trimming 
the  best  brick  buildings  in  many  towns  and  cities.  The  bed-rock  at 
Kasota  is  of  this  one  kind  of  sandstone.  But  around  about  on  the 
surface,  in  the  fields  and  by  the  roadsides,  are  boulders  such  as  these 
we  have  gathered  from  the  fields  and  roadsides  of  our  own  State.  So 
also  about  Sioux  Falls,  are  boulders  in  the  fields  and  along  the  road- 
sides, but  in  the  quarries  there  is  only  the  one  kind  of  rock,  quartzite. 

Now  if  we  could  dig  down  deep  enough  in  our  own  State  we  should 
by  and  by  come  to  bed-rock.  In  some  parts  of  the  State  we  should 
find  this  to  be  limestone,  in  other  parts  sandstone,  and  in  others  shale. 
The  sandstone  would  be  different  from  that  at  Kasota,  however.  If 


28  THE   STORY   OF   THE    PRAIRIES. 

we  should  go  north  into  Canada,  away  to  Hudson's  Bay,  for  instance, 
or  about  Lake  Superior,  we  should  find  the  bed-rock  to  be  like  some 
of  the  boulders  we  have  in  our  collection.  In  some  places  we  should 
find  granite,  in  other  places  quartzite,  and  hornblendes,  and  augites. 
So  similar  are  the  bed-rocks  in  those  localities  to  the  pieces  or  boul- 
ders which  we  have  collected  here,  and  so  much  do  the  scattered  boul- 
ders look  as  if  they  had  come  from  some  other  place,  that  we  almost 
begin  to  wonder  if  in  some  way  our  boulders  did  not  come  from  about 
the  Hudson  Bay  or  Lake  Superior  country.  In  a  later  chapter  we 
shall  see  that  there  is  reason  for  thinking  that  many  of  our  boulders  and 
a  large  amount  of  finer  materials  have  really  been  brought  from  these 
far-off  regions.  All  the  boulders,  pebbles  and  sand-grains  of  our  prai- 
ries and  fields  have  come  from  other  places  where  the  bed-rock  is  the 
same  kind  of  rock  as  these  boulders.  In  other  words  these  boulders 
are  pieces  broken  off  from  the  layers  or  strata  of  the  bed-rock  where 
these  come  to,  or  near  to,  the  surface.  They  are  fragments  which  have 
been  broken  from  many  different  quarries  in  many  different  places,  and 
carried  sometimes  hundreds  of  miles  to  where  we  find  them  in  the 
fields.  Some  of  the  pieces  were  very  large  and  heavy  when  first 
broken.  In  the  process  of  moving  they  have  become  a  good  deal 
broken,  big  blocks  being  broken  up  into  small  pieces,  the  corners  worn 
off,  and  the  whole  surface  made  smooth. 

When  a  large  rock  is  broken  into  smaller  blocks  there  are  always 
some  small  fragments  formed,  and  when  a  corner  gets  knocked  off 
from  a  rock  by  striking  against  another  rock  more  small  fragments 
are  broken  off.  The  only  difference  between  boulders  and  sand  is  in 
the  size  of  the  fragments.  A  boulder  may  be  broken  into  several 
smaller  boulders,  and  these  may  be  again  broken  into  pebbles,  and 
these  in  turn  are  only  larger  grains  of  sand.  They  all  get  smoothed 
and  rounded  by  being  jostled  and  rubbed  against  each  other  and 
against  other  hard  things  which  are  in  their  wray,  or  which  are  moved 
against  them.  Indeed  soil  and  the  clays  of  the  fields  and  hills  are 
mostly  ground-up  rock.  The  softer  boulders  are  more  easily  worn  to 
powder  and  broken.  The  boulders,  the  larger  ones,  those  which  are 
well  rounded  and  smoothed,  and  which  have  been  quite  correctly  called 
"hard-heads,"  are  the  harder  masses  which  have  been  broken  loose 
from  the  bed-rock  somewhere  and  by  reason  of  their  being  so  hard 
have  not  been  worn  out  and  made  into  soil.  If  you  examine  the 
grains  of  a  handful  of  sand  from  a  sand-pit  you  will  find  it  to  be  made 


EXCURSIONS  AFIELD.  29 

up  of  hard  particles  of  stone.  The  grains  will  be  largely  quartz  grains, 
and  bits  of  feldspar  and  other  hard  minerals.  You  will  generally  find 
but  few  grains  of  mica  or  limestone  because  these  are  softer  and  more 
easily  ground  to  powder.  These  have  been  ground  into  earth  and 
clay.  Nearly  all  the  sand  patches  or  sandpits,  like  the  sands  of  the 
sea-shore,  are  whitish,  and  this  is  because  it  is  largely  grains  of  hard 
whitish  quartz. 

Because  the  boulders,  sand  and  clay  of  our  fields  have  come  from 
somewhere  else,  have  drifted  here  from  other  regions,  this  material  is 
called  "Drift,"  and  the  boulders  are  often  spoken  of  as  "foreign"  boul- 
ders or  drift  rocks  to  distinguish  them  from  the  rocks  which  have 
come  from  our  own  quarries  or  from  the  bed-rock  near  where  the  pieces 
are  found. 

All  of  North  Dakota  except  that  part  of  the  State  which  lies  west 
of  the  Missouri  River  is  covered  with  a  great  sheet  or  mantle  of  "drift." 
In  some  parts  of  the  State  this  covering  of  drift  is  very  deep,  being  more 
than  300  feet  in  some  places  in  the  eastern  part  of  the  State.  It  becomes 
thinner  toward  the  west  till  along  the  Missouri  River  it  is  only  a  few  feet 
thick  and  further  west  disappears  entirely. 

The  black  soil  of  our  fields  does  not  extend  down  very  far,  as  you 
have  likely  noticed.  But  if  you  have  watched  the  digging  of  a  deep 
well  or  a  place  where  any  deep  excavation  was  being  made,  you  have 
seen  that  clay  and  boulders  occur  down  to  a  much  greater  depth,  and 
probably  no  shelf  or  layer  of  rock  was  struck  such  as  you  saw  in  the 
quarries. 

All  these  materials,  these  many  millions  of  tons  of  clay,  boulders, 
sand,  and  gravel  and  most  of  the  soil  also,  which  cover  nearly  the 
whole  State,  are  drift,  and  the  time  during  which  this  vast  amount  of 
work  was  being  done  is  known  as  the  "Drift  Period,"  or  Glacial  Period. 
It  was  the  last  great  geologic  period  before  that  in  which  man  lives,  the 
period  of  written  history. 

\Ye  shall,  in  the  next  few  pages,  try  to  see  how  the  boulders,  peb- 
bles, sand,  and  clay  were  carried  and  how  they  come  to  be  left  as 
they  are. 


CHAPTER    THE   THIRD. 
THE  WORK  OF  ICE. 

The  Great  Ice  Sheet. — All  of  North  Dakota  east  of  the  Missouri 
River  is  embraced  in  that  part  of  North  America  which  was  covered 
by  the  ice  during  the  Glacial  Period.  We  have  wondered  how  the 
boulders  and  rounded  pebbles  came  to  be  here,  scattered  all  about  as 
they  are,  when  they  are  so  different  from  the  bed-rocks  and  also  so 
different  from  each  other.  Geologists  agree  that  ice  was  the  agent 
which  transported  these  rocks  here;  that  it  was  by  the  action  of  the  ice 
that  the  rock  fragments  were  first  broken  from  their  parent  ledges  and 
carried,  smoothed,  broken,  and  ground  to  powder;  that  the  way  the 
boulders,  gravel  and  sand  are  distributed  is  due  to  the  ice  melting  and 
leaving  the  rocks  which  it  carried;  and  the  peculiar  hills  and  rolling 
prairies  which  mark  the  landscape  have  been  formed  by  the  dumping  of 
these  transported  materials  from  the  great  ice-plow. 

All  the  northern  portion  of  North  America  was  covered  by  this 
great  flood  of  ice.  In  all  the  northern  states  from  North  Dakota  to 
Maine  and  the  Atlantic  Coast  about  New  York  City  occur  boulders, 
sand  and  clay,  and  peculiar  rounded  hills  such  as-  are  seen  between 
Larimore  and  Devils  Lake,  along  the  line  of  the  Great  Northern  Rail- 
way, about  Cooperstown  in  Griggs  County,  west  of  Hope  in  Steele 
County,  at  intervals  along  the  line  of  the  Northern  Pacific  Railway 
from  east  of  Valley  City  to  Bismarck,  east  of  Lisbon  in  Ransom  County, 
about  Oakes  in  Dickey  County,  and,  in  fact,  here  and  there  through- 
out the  whole  State  west  of  the  eastern  tier  of  counties  and  east  of  the 
Missouri  River,  occur  irregular  generally  rounded  hills,  and  valleys 
without  outlets.  These  are  hills  which  mark  positions  where  the  edge 
of  the  great  ice-sheet  stood  for  a  time,  and,  melting,  left  the  mate- 
rials of  which  these  hills  are  composed.  Wherever  such  hills  are  seen 
the  country  has  been  "glaciated." 

The  ice-sheet  was  a  good  deal  deeper  or  thicker  in  some  places  than 
in  others.  \Ve  shall  get  the  right  idea  if  we  think  of  the  great  flood  of 
ice  slowly  flowing  or  shoving  its  way  across  the  country,  covering  the 


THE  WORK  OF  ICE. 


31 


32  THE   STORY   OF   THE   PRAIRIES. 

hills  and  filling  the  valleys,  planing  off  the  hill-tops  and  filling  the  val- 
leys with  the  materials  of  the  hills.  It  may  seem  a  little  strange  to 
think  of  ice  flowing  over  the  land,  but  there  are  a  great  many  strange 
things  in  the  world  and  we  should  not  refuse  to  study  them  because 
they  are  strange.  In  another  chapter  we  shall  try  to  see  some  of  the 
reasons  which  have  led  geologists  to  think  that  it  was  a  great  ice-flood, 
a  vast  sheet  of  snow-ice  slowly  creeping  or  flowing  from  the  northeast 
toward  the  southwest  which  has  caused  all  these  strange  things.  We 
must  try  to  be  fair  and  honest  in  a  study  of  this  kind  and  not  refuse  to 
think  about  things  because  we  cannot  at  first  understand  them,  or  can- 
not see  how  such  things  can  be. 

No  one  claims  that  we  know  these  to  be  the  facts  absolutely.  No 
man  was  on  the  earth  at  this  time  to  write  a  history  of  what  occurred; 
or  if  there  were  any  men  then  at  least  they  did  not  write  any  history 
which  we  know  about.  All  that  we  can  tell  about  what  occurred  is  by 
studying  the  records  left  in  the  rocks  and  clays  and  gravels,  and  the 
peculiar  hills  and  valleys.  The  collection  of  boulders,  pebbles  and  sand, 
the  clay  dug  up  from  below  the  fertile  soil,  the  hills  and  hollows  them- 
selves which  we  walked  over  and  through,  and  the  rocks  we  studied  in 
the  field,  all  enter  into  the  great  subject  of  the  history  of  this  period 
of  the  earth's  changes. 

Without  trying  at  this  time  to  explain  the  causes  of  the  extreme 
cold  which  made  such  a  gathering  of  snow  and  ice  possible,  let  us  see 
what  the  physicist  says,  the  man  who  has  studied  the  action  of  ice 
and  snow  and  water,  and  other  substances  under  various 
conditions,  about  the  behavior  of  ice  in  very  large  masses.  Then  we 
may  afterwards  seek  what  reasons  or  evidences  there  are  for  thinking 
that  ice  was  the  agent  which  did  all  this  work;  or  that  what  has  been 
called  an  "ice-invasion"  has  really  at  some  time  occurred. 

Behavior  of  Ice  Under  Pressure. — >We  are  accustomed  to  think  of  ice 
as  a  brittle  substance;  and  we  know  that  when  struck  a  sharp  blow  with 
a  hard  instrument  it  will  break  into  pieces.  But  it  can  be  shown  in  a 
laboratory  where  all  things  needed  are  at  hand,  or  in  great  glaciers 
where  the  mass  of  ice  is  very  great,  that  when  ice  is  placed  under  great 
pressure  and  acted  upon  slowly  and  steadily  for  a  long  time  it  not  only 
does  not  break  into  pieces  as  a  brittle  solid  but  actually  flows  very 
much  as  a  mass  of  resin  or  cold,  thick  pitch  will  flow  if  it  is  given  time, 
bulging  out  on  all  sides  from  the  pressure  of  its  own  weight. 

To  get  some  idea  of  the  way  the  ice  will  act  let  us  use  some  figures. 


THE   WORK   OF  ICE.  33 

A  cubic  foot  of  ice  weighs  about  62.25  pounds.  If  we  imagine  two 
blocks  of  this  size  placed  one  upon  the  other,  the  bottom  one  will  hold 
up  a  weight  of  62.25  pounds.  If  ten  blocks  are  piled  up  on  top  of  the 
first  one  then  the  bottom  one  will  be  holding  up  622.5  pounds.  If  we 
imagine  the  blocks  to  be  piled  up  as  high  as  the  highest  grain  elevator, 
say  100  feet  high,  then  the  pressure  upon  the  bottom  due  to  the  weight 
of  the  ice  blocks  would  be  6,225  pounds,  or  more  than  three  tons. 
Imagine  the  whole  weight  of  a  load  of  a  hundred  bushels  of  wheat 
to  rest  upon  one  such  block  of  ice.  It  would  be  crushed,  would  it  not? 
Now,  suppose  that  the  whole  landscape  round  about  were  covered 
with  ice  to  a  thickness  of  100  feet.  Each  square  foot  of  land  might  be 
thought  of  as  having  a  pile  of  one  hundred  foot-cubes  of  ice  resting 
upon  it.  Each  bottom  cube  would  be  prevented  from  crushing  the  way 
the  load  of  wheat  was  imagined  to  crush  a  single  block  because  there 
would  be  more  blocks  all  around  it  and  each  one  trying  just  as  hard 
to  crush.  The  lower  layer  of  ice  would  therefore  be  under  a  great 
stress. 

Now,  in  parts  of  the  country  where  there  are  high  mountains,  as  the 
White  Mountains  in  the  state  of  New  Hampshire,  drift  boulders  and 
pebbles  on  the  tops  of  these  mountains  show  that  the  ice  covered  their 
tops,  or,  in  other  words,  the  thickness  of  the  ice  was  so  great  that  the 
high  mountains  were  buried.  Some  of  those  mountains  which  were 
so  covered  are  more  than  a  mile  high,  that  is,  their  summits  are  more 
than  a  mile  vertically  above  their  bases,  and  drift  boulders  and  gravel 
are  found  upon  their  sides  and  up  to  their  very  summits.  The  ice 
must  therefore  have  been  more  than  a  mile  deep  in  those  regions. 
Many  careful  observations  have  led  to  the  conclusion  that  the  ice  was 
in  some  places  two  or  more  miles  deep.  What,  then,  must  have  been 
the  pressure  upon  the  bottom  layers  due  to  the  weight  of  the  ice?  One 
mile  is  5,280  feet.  The  pressure  upon  the  bottom  of  each  square  foot, 
therefore,  must  be  5,280  times  62.25  pounds,  or  328,680  pounds,  or 
nearly  165  tons.  Since  the  ice  cannot  crush,  being  hemmed  in  on  all 
sides  by  more  ice  under  just  the  same  pressure,  the  stress  upon  the 
bottom  layers  will  be  very  great.  Under  these  conditions  of  great 
pressure  ice  behaves  like  a  thick,  viscous  substance,  such  as  pitch  or 
thick  tar. 

An  Illustration. — Let  us  imagine  a  large  cask  or  barrel  filled  with 
hard  pitch.  It  appears  solid,  and  if  a  piece  of  it  is  struck  a  sharp  blow 
it  will  break  much  like  a  brittle  rock  or  a  piece  of  ice.  Suppose  we 


34 


THE   STORY   OF   THE   PRAIRIES. 


should  knock,  the  barrel -to  pieces  and  leave  the  pitch  standing  in  a 
great  block.  It  will  have  the  form  of  the  inside  of  the  barrel.  But  let 
it  stand  for  some  time,  say  a  week  or  a  month,  and  it  will  be  seen  to 
have  bulged  out  at  the  sides  near  the  bottom.  Leave  it  longer.  The 
mass  no  longer  has  the  form  of  the  inside  of  the  barrel.  It  is  flattening 
down  and  broadening  out  at  the  base.  Leave  it  for  a  still  longer  time, 
for  a  year  maybe,  or  even  two  years,  and  it  will  have  flattened  out  so 
that  no  one  would  ever  think  that  it  had  once  had  the  form  of  the  inside 
of  a  cask  or  barrel. 

Now,  suppose  such  a  block  of  pitch  is  left  to  stand  on  a  level  floor. 
It  would  flatten  out  and  flow  over  the  floor  from  the  pressure  due  to 
its  own  weight.  If  there  were  some  marbles  or  small  stones  lying  upon 
the  floor  scattered  about  or  in  little  heaps,  the  pitch  would  flow  over 


FIG.  10. 


these  and  shove  them  along  with  itself.  If  the  block  of  pitch  were  on 
the  cellar  bottom  where  there  were  small  hollows  it  would  fill  these  and 
push  on  over  them.  If  there  were  small  gravel  stones  in  these  hollows 
some  of  these  would  be  shoved  along  up  out  of  the  hollows  and  pushed 
over  the  uneven  surface. 

If  we  now  can  imagine  the  pitch  to  disappear  by  some  means  with- 
out disturbing  the  pebbles  it  has  moved  over  the  cellar  bottom,  we 
should  find  these  pebbles  to  have  been  shoved  into  a  somewhat  irregu- 
lar row  near  where  the  edge  of  the  spreading  pitch  had  been. 

In  much  the  same  way  the  ice  flowed  across  the  continent,  filling 
the  valleys  and  crossing  the  hills  as  the  pitch  flowed  over  the  cellar 
bottom  and  filled  and  crossed  the  hollows  and  hummocks.  The  great 
pressure  from  the  accumulation  of  snow  in  the  interior  of  the  continent 
caused  the  outward  flow.  In  the  interior  of  the  continent  the  ice 
melted  on  the  land  when  it  had  flowed  southward  into  the  warmer 


THE  WORK   OF   ICE.  35 

climate  of  lower  latitudes.  Off  the  coast  of  New  England  the  edge  of 
the  great  ice-sheet  pushed  off  into  the  sea.  In  the  latter  case  the  rock- 
fragments  carried  by  the  ice  were  thrust  off  into  the  sea.  But  in  the 
former  case,  where  the  ice  melted  on  the  land,  the  broken  rock,  some 
of  which  had  been  ground  to  fine  powder  forming  clay,  and  the  small 
fragments  in  the  form  of  gravel  and  sand,  together  with  the  large  boul- 
ders, were  left  where  the  melting  ice  dropped  them. 

Alpine  Glaciers. — Ice  can  be  seen  flowing  down  mountain  sides  at 
the  present  time  in  many  countries,  in  Switzerland,  Norway,  Green- 
land, Alaska  and  the  Rocky  Mountains  in  our  own  country.  Ice- 
streams  flowing  down  the  slopes  of  mountains  are  called  Alpine  Gla- 
ciers, from  the  Alps  Mountains  in  Switzerland,  where  there  are  splendid 
examples  of  glaciers  in  action,  and  because  it  was  there  that  the  flow 
of  ice  in  glaciers  was  first  studied. 

If  you  have  been  on  the  top  of  Pike's  Peak,  or  through  the  Yellow- 
stone National  Park,  in  the  hottest  months  of  summer  you  have  seen 
great  patches  of  snow  here  and  there  among  the  crags  and  pinnacles, 
above  what  is  known  as  the  "snow-line."  Where  there  are  high  moun- 
tains with  their  crests  reaching  far  above  the  snow-line  the  summers 
are  not  warm  enough  to  cause  all  the  snow  to  melt,  and  so  it  continues 
to  gather  in  the  hollows  high  among  the  clouds  and  craggy  peaks. 

When,o<n  the  mountain  tops,  enough  snow  gathers  so  that  its  weight 
becomes  very  great  the  lower  layers  become  more  like  ice  than  snow 
because  of  the  pressure  from  the  mass  overlying.  And  if  the  amount 
of  snow  becomes  very  great  it  will  by  and  by  begin  to  move  slowly 
down  the  mountain. 

The  snow  does  not  need  to  gather  upon  a  mountain  slope  in  order 
to  flow.  We  saw  that  stiff,  hard  pitch  flowed  across  a  level  surface  by 
reason  of  its  own  weight.  The  place  of  starting  of  glaciers  is  often 
high  on  mountain  tops  where  it  is  too  cold  even  in  mid-summer  for 
all  the  snow  to  melt.  But  a  glacier  may  be  formed  upon  a  level  sur- 
face, the  conditions  which  cause  a  glacier  being  that  more  snow  shall 
fall  during  the  winter  than  melts  during  the  summer. 

When  either  high  upon  mountain  tops  or  on  a  plain,  therefore, 
more  snow  falls  than  melts,  so  that  it  gathers  deeper  and  deeper  and 
piles  up  higher  and  higher;  after  a  while  the  snow  which  is  near  the 
bottom  becomes  pressed  so  hard  by  the  weight  of  that  which  lies  above 
it  that  it  changes  its  form  from  flaky  snow  into  a  sort  of  snow-ice 
known  as  neve,  and  when  the  pressure  has  become  great  enough  it  will 


36 


THE   STORY   OF  THE   PRAIRIES. 


begin  to  flow  out  at  the  sides  or  edges  of  the  snow-field  and  push  down 
the  mountain  side,  or  out  over  the  plain. 

Moraines. — Stones  and  various  fragments  of  earth  are  carried  down 
by  Alpine  glaciers,  and  as  the  ice  melts  when  it  gets  down  into  the 
valleys,  or  down  the  mountain  sides  where  it  is  warmer,  it  leaves  the 
stone-fragments  which  have  been  carried  or  pushed  along.  These 
materials  are  left  in  irregular  heaps  and  piles,  and  are  known  as  Mo- 
raines, from  a  French  word  meaning  "a  heap  of  stones." 

Those  rounded  hills  and  long,  irregular  ridges  which  we  have  no- 


FlG.  ii.     View  Along  the  Top  of  a  Terminal  Moraine. 
Photograph  by  Ray  Abel. 


Western  Walsh  County. 


ticed  west  of  Larimore  and  Hope,  about  Cooperstown,  Valley  City  and 
Oakes,  are  morainic  hills,  and  the  whole  group  of  hills  to  which  they 
belong,  in  each  locality,  is  a  Moraine.  They  were  left  where  they  are 
by  the  melting  of  the  ice  of  the  great  continental  ice-sheet,  just  as  the 
smaller  heaps  and  irregular  piles  of  broken  stone  and  earth,  left  by  the 
melting  of  the  glaciers  on  the  mountain  sides  of  Switzerland,  or  on  the 
west  coast  of  Greenland,  are  Moraines. 

There  are  several  kinds  of  Moraines,  or,  rather,  several  forms  in 
which  "heaps  of  stones"  or  earth  are  deposited  by  the  melting  ice.  At 
the  lower  edge  of  the  ice,  where  the  melting  back  is  just  about  equal 


THE   WORK   OF   ICE.  37 

to  the  pushing  down,  so  that  the  glacier  end  seems  to  stand  still,  will 
be  a  great  gathering  place  of  broken  stones,  earth  and  soil  which  were 
carried  down  by  the  ice.  These  will  be  dumped 'in  heaps  and  irregular 
ridges.  Small  fragments  of  rock,  sand,  clay  and  soil  from  the  land- 
surface  will  all  be  piled  together  in  great  confusion.  Hollows  will  be 
between  these  knolls  and  ridges,  small  and  large,  round  and  irregular, 
deep  and  shallow,  and  some  of  them  will  be  filled  with  water  from  the 
melting  ice. 

This  whole  affair- — the  heaps  and  piles  of  earth  and  broken  rock, 
the  irregular  ridges,  the  hollows  and  lakes — makes  up  what  is  called  a 
Terminal  Moraine.  It  is  called  terminal  because  it  is  at  the  terminus 
or  end  of  the  glacier. 

On  the  sides  of  glaciers  rock  and  soil  gather  from  the  grinding  of 
the  ice  against  the  hillsides  along  which  it  passes,  and  from  crags  falling 
upon  the  edge  of  the  moving  ice.  Often  these  materials  form  long 
ridges  or  piles  which  extend  for  long  distances  along  the  edge  of  the 
ice-stream.  These  are  sometimes  upon  the  ice  and  being  carried  along 
with  it,  and  sometimes  they  occur  as  ridges  skirting  the  edge  of  the 
ice  but  upon  the  ground.  Such  a  line  of  broken  rock  and  soil  is  a  Lat- 
eral Moraine,  so  named  because  formed  on  the  side  of  the  glacier.  If 
the  glacier  melts  awray  entirely  these  long  side-ridges  are  left  upon  the 
sides  of  the  valley  down  which  the  glacier  moved.  They  are  side 
moraines,  therefore,  in  just  the  same  way  that  terminal  moraines  are 
end  moraines. 

It  frequently  happens  in  mountains  where  glaciers  exist  that  two  or 
more  smaller  streams  of  snow-ice  from  higher  up  the  mountain  run 
together  lower  down  and  form  one  larger  ice-stream,  just  as  the 
branches  or  tributaries  of  a  river  run  together  to  form  a  larger  river. 
On  the  sides  of  each  of  these  branch  or  tributary  glaciers  there  are 
lateral  moraines.  When,  therefore,  two  such  streams  come  together 
two  lateral  moraines  will  meet,  like  the  two  parts  of  a  letter  V,  and 
below  the  point  of  meeting  the  two  ridges  will  become  one,  and  this 
will  continue  down  the  course  of  the  larger  stream,  but  in  the  midst  of 
it  and  not  at  the  side  or  edge.  The  two  lateral  moraines  which  unite 
form  a  single  ridge  like  the  stem  of  the  letter  Y,  and  this  is  known  as 
a  Medial  Moraine,  because  it  is  carried  on  the  middle  of  the  glacier. 

Sometimes  a  glacier  moves  farther  down  a  mountain  valley  than  at 
other  times.  We  have  seen  how  a  terminal  moraine  is  formed  at  the 
end  of  a  glacier.  If  now  the  ice  should  melt  back  for  some  time  faster 


38  THE   STORY   OF   THE   PRAIRIES. 

than  it  moved  down  the  slope  then  the  belt  of  terminal  moraine  ridges, 
heaps  and  hollows,  and  maybe  lakes,  would  be  left  below  the  glacier.  If 
then  the  glacier  should  advance,  or  move  down  more  rapidly  than  it 
melted  at  its  lower  end,  the  ridges,  heaps  and  hollows  would  be  ridden 
over  and  shoved  farther  down  the  slope.  Along  the  bottom  of  the 
glacier,  on  the  ground  which  the  ice-stream  passes  over,  pieces  of  rock 
which  are  broken  off  from  projecting  crags,  loose  fragments  of  stone 
lying  upon  the  surface  of  the  ground,  and  soil,  would  be  shoved  along 
and  ground  under  or  near  the  bottom  of  the  ice.  This  material,  to- 
gether with  that  of  the  terminal  'moraine  which  is  pushed  along  and 
over  by  the  advancing  ice  will  be  shoved  into  hollows  and  ground  to 
powder  on  the  hard  bottom.  When  the  glacier  melts  back  and  un- 
covers this  material,  or  when  the  glacier  disappears  altogether,  as  many 
glaciers  have  done,  this  will  be  left  as  a  Ground  Moraine. 

There  are  thus  seen  to  be  four  kinds  or  forms  of  moraines,  Ter- 
minal, Lateral,  Medial  and  Ground.  These  are  not  always  sharply  sep- 
arated from  each  other.  It  is  not  easy  sometimes  to  see  just  where  one 
begins  and  another  ends.  All  these  forms  of  deposits  from  glaciers  are 
of  interest  to  us  because  they  all  occur  on  a  very  large  and  grand  scale, 
making  conspicuous  landscape  features  in  North  Dakota,  and  all  the 
Northern  States  and  Canada.  Various  forms  and  modifications  of  these 
make  up  many,  indeed,  most  of  the  hills  and  swells  of  the  prairies  of 
our  State. 


CHAPTER  THE  FOURTH. 
AN   EXCURSION  TO  SOME  GLACIERS. 

Illustrations  from  Norway. — Norway  furnishes  many  good  examples 
of  alpine  glaciers,  and  much  may  be  learned  about  the  hills  and  prairies 
of  our  own  State  by  studying  the  behavior  of  glaciers  as  they  exist 
to-day.  We  cannot  all  go  to  Norway,  or  to  Switzerland,  or  even  to 
the  snow-capped  mountains  in  our  own  country  where  glaciers  flow 
down  their  sides.  Since  it  is  not  possible  for  us  to  see  the  actual 
glaciers,  let  us  see  how  much  we  can  learn  from  pictures. 

In  Figure  12  the  barren  and  lofty  peaks  of  the  Jotenheimen  Moun- 
tains in  Norway  are  shown.  Here  is  the  gathering-ground  of  the  snow 
which  descends  the  mountain  sides  as  glaciers.  This  is  said  to  be  the 
wildest  and  most  bleak  and  dreary  tract  in  all  Norway.  Here  the 
mountain  tops  are  rock,  naked  of  any  vegetation,  and  covered  in  some 
places  the  whole  year  with  ice  and  snow.  Standing  on  the  high,  cold, 
bleak  landscape,  nothing  but  crags,  snow,  ice  and  lakes  formed  from 
melting  snow  can  be  seen  for  long  distances.  The  water  from  the 


FIG. 


The  Snow-field  on  the  Mountain  Top. 
Photograph  by  A.  Thorson, 


40 


THE   STORY   OF   THE   PRAIRIES. 


melting  of  the  snows  of  this  region  in  part  goes  to  the  Atlantic  Ocean 
on  the  west  coast  of  Norway,  and  in  part  south  by  the  River  Glommen 
past  Christiania  to  the  Skager  Rack.  The  distance  shown  in  the  pic- 
ture, from  the  foreground  to  the  high  crags  in  the  background,  is  about 
ten  miles.  The  highest  of  the  crags  in  this  group  are  the  loftiest  peaks 
in  Norway.  A  glacier  flows  down  the  mountain  side  to  the  right  from 
the  snow-field  shown  in  the  foreground.  Another  large  glacier  de- 


FlG.  13.     A  Glacier  and  Terminal  Moraines.    Photograph  by  A.  Thorson. 

scends  to  the  left  from  the  snow-field  among  the  crags  in  the  back- 
ground. The  waters  from  the  melting  of  this  glacier  are  the  head- 
waters of  the  largest  river  in  Norway,  the  River  Glommen. 

Figure  13  shows  an  ice-stream  or  glacier  as  it  moves  slowly  down 
the  side  of  the  mountain.  In  the  foreground  is  shown  the  dumping- 
ground  of  the  materials  carried  by  the  ice,  the  terminal  moraine  of  the 
glacier.  It  is  a  belt  and  not  a  simple  ridge.  The  distance  across  this 
belt  of  ridges,  heaps  and  irregular  mounds  of  boulders  or  rock-frag- 
ments, gravel,  sand  and  earth,  is  about  three-fourths  of  a  mile,  from 


AN   EXCURSION   TO   SOME   GLACIERS. 


41 


the  extreme  foreground  of  the  picture  to  the  edge  of  the  ice.  Six 
morainic  ridges  can  be  seen,  counting  the  one  at  the  extreme  front  on 
which  the  top  of  a  small  tree  appears. 

Then  comes  a  broad,  low  moraine  with  gravel  and  coarse  pieces  of 
rock,  the  large  fragments  of  rock  showing  dark  in  the  picture.  Two 
or  three  huge  masses  stand  above  the  general  surface — immense  blocks 
broken  from  the  mountain  side,  shoved  down  with  the  ice  and  dropped 
here  where  the  ice  melted.  The  light  belt  behind  these  is  the  crooked 
stream  of  ice-water  which  flows  from  under  the  glacier. 

Next  are  two  large,  ragged,  dark-appearing  ridges  which  are  cov- 
ered with  scattering,  scrubby  trees.  The  stream  from  under  the  ice 
comes  from  the  right  in  the  picture  from  between  these  two  ridges  and 
turns  sharply  back  toward  the  right. 

Farthest  over  and  near  the  ice-front  is  another  riclge.  Still  another 
which  cannot  be  seen  lies  back  of  this,  between  it  and  the  ice-wall.  All 
these  ridges,  all  the  sand,  gravel  and  boulders,  make  up  the  terminal 
moraine.  Sometimes  a  single  ridge  is  spoken  of  as  a  moraine,  but  the 
term  is  correctly  applied  to  all  the  ridges  and  piles  which  together  make 
up  the  dumping-ground  of  a  glacier  at  any  period  of  its  existence. 


FIG.  14.     An  Ice  Cave.     Photograph  by  A.  Thorson. 


42 


THE   STORY   OF  THE   PRAIRIES. 


If  the  glacier  has  at  some  time  extended  considerably  farther 
down  the  mountain  side  and  left  a  moraine  there,  and  i:his  older 
moraine  is  separated  from  the  later  or  the  one  forming  now  by  a  tract 
which  is  comparatively  free  from  boulders  and  piles  of  gravel  and  earth, 
then  these  are  often  spoken  of  as  the  older  and  the  younger  moraines. 
They  represent  stages  of  advance  and  retreat  of  the  glacier. 


FIG.  15.     An  Ice  Cascade.     Photograph  by  A.  Thorson. 

' 

Back  of  the  dark-appearing  terminal  moraine  ridge  in  the  left  of 
the  picture  is  a  lateral  moraine,  marked  v  v.  This  is  a  sharp-crested 
ridge  of  broken  stones,  earth  and  debris  from  the  mountain  side.  At 
the  places  marked  v  along  the  side  of  the  glacier  are  ridges  and  heaps 
of  earth  and  stones  thirty  feet  high,  which  belong  to  the  lateral  moraine 
of  the  glacier,  and  are  still  being  carried  along  with  the  ice.  Dark 
patches  along  the  side  of  the  ice  at  the  foot  of  the  mountain  si4e  and 
extending  up  the  glacier  are  also  heaps  of  earth  and  stones  belonging 
to  the  lateral  moraine. 

Figure  14  shows  a  near  view  of  a  small  part  of  the  same -ice-front 
which  was  seen  from  a  distance  in  Figure  13.  A  great  cave  is  hollowed 


AN   EXCURSION   TO   SOME    GLACIERS. 


43 


out  in  the  ice-wall,  out  of  which  flows  the  sub-glacial  or  under-the-ice 
stream  shown  in  Figure  13.  The  ice  is  clean,  blue  and  hard.  Huge 
blocks  have  fallen  from  the  melting  and  undermining  at  the  bottom. 
The  man  is  standing  on  the  ridge  of  stones  and  broken  ice  which  was 
spoken  of  before  as  lying  close  to  the  ice,  and  not  able  to  be  seen  in 
Figure  13. 

In  Figure  15  more  than  half  of  the  picture,  embracing  the  fore- 
ground from  the  upper  left  corner  to  the  upper  side  of  the  black  belt 
near  the  lower  right  corner,  is  a  part  of  the  lateral  moraine  of  the 
glacier.  The  crest  of  the  moraine  is  the  dark  part  running  diagonally 
across  the  middle  of  the  picture.  The  rugged  surface  of  the  glacier  ic 
back  of  the  dark  crest  of  the  moraine,  behind  the  two  men.  It  moves 
from  near  the  upper  left  corner  toward  the  centre  of  the  right  side  of 
the  picture.  The  snow  in  which  the  men  are  standing  has  fallen  upon 
the  moraine  and  is  not  part  of  the  glacier.  The  big,  dark  boulders  or 
blocks  of  rock  in  the  snow  are  part  of  the  lateral  moraine. 

In  Figure  16  a  nearer  view  of  the  front  of  the  glacier  is  shown  than 
in  Figure  13.  The  morainic  ridge  which  lies  close  against  the  ice  is  cut 


FIG.  16.    Terminal  Moraine,  Front  of  Glacier,  and  Glacier  in  Distance. 
Photograph  by  A    Thorson. 


44  THE   STORY   OF   THE   PRAIRIES. 

through  by  the  sub-glacial  stream  which  comes  from  under  the  ice 
where  the  black  place  is  seen  at  the  bottom  of  the  ice,  near  the  centre 
of  the  picture  in  the  foreground.  At  the  time  this  picture  was  taken 
the  ridge  was  being  pressed  upon  by  the  ice  and  apparently  shoved 
down  by  it. 

Near  the  centre  of  the  picture  is  a  part  of  the  glacier  where  the  ice 
is  broken  into  a  chowder  by  a  fall  or  slide  down  a  precipice  about  3,000 
feet.  The  precipice  is  shown  just  back  of  the  white  place  in  the  centre 
of  the  picture.  This  is  what  is  called  an  ice  cascade  or  cataract,  corre- 
sponding to  what  in  rivers  of  water  instead  of  ice  is  a  water-fall.  The 
ice  goes  over  this  great  cataract  in  immense  masses,  crashing  with  tre- 
mendous force  down  over  the  rocky  steep,  making  a  noise  like  the 
heaviest  thunder.  There  is  a  roaring  and  booming  as  of  a  mighty  can- 
nonading as  the  great,  slowly-creeping  mass  of  ice  comes  to  this  jump- 
ing-off  place,  breaks  up  into  huge  masses  by  its  own  weight,  and  goes 
crashing  down  this  great  '"toboggan."  The  ice  is  not  only  shattered  by 
the  fall,  but  it  is  shivered  into  snow-dust,  and  this  loose  mass  of  snow- 
powder  is  what  is  seen  in  the  centre  of  the  picture. 

The  sub-glacial  stream  which  has  been  noticed  before  coming  out 
from  under  the  ice,  descends  into  the  ice  at  the  foot  of  the  cataract 
where  some  of  the  ice  is  melted  by  the  friction  from  the  fall,  and  flows 
under  the  glacier  till  it  emerges  at  the  end  or  foot  of  the  glacier. 

Below,  toward  the  foreground  of  the  picture,  the  ice-powder  has 
become  solid  ice  again,  and  at  the  ice-front  or  end  of  the  glacier  it  is 
seen  to  be  hard,  blue,  stratified  ice. 

The  ice  in  the  background  of  Figure  16  is  the  same  as  that  in  Figure 
15,  and  the  lateral  moraine  in  Figure  15  is  behind  the  dark  mountain  in 
the  background  at  the  left  in  Figure  16. 

Figure  17  is  taken  a  little  to  the  right  of  Figure  16.  The  man  is 
standing  in  the  edge  of  the  river  which  flows  away  from  the  glacier. 
The  morainic  ridge  is  about  eight  feet  high,  and  is  being  pushed  by 
the  ice  from  behind.  It  is  composed  of  small  broken  stones  and  coarse 
gravel.  The  pieces  of  rock  are  mostly  angular,  not  having  been  carried 
in  the  ice  far  enough  to  become  much  rounded. 

Figure  18  shows  a  part  of  the  ice-front  taken  a  little  to  the  left  of 
Figure  17.  The  stratified  structure  of  the  ice  is  here  well  shown.  The 
morainic  ridge  near  the  ice  is  about  twenty  feet  high.  The  two  black 
places  at  the  bottom  of  the  ice  show  where  water  emerges  from  under  the 
glacier  to  form  the  river  of  ice-water  noticed  in  Figure  13.  The  morainic 


FIG.  17.     Terminal  Moraine  and  Ice  Front  Crowding  Upon  It. 
Photograph  by  A.  Thorson. 


FIG. 


Terminal  Moraine  Being  Washed  Away  by  Glacial  Stream. 
Photograph  by  A.  Thorson. 


46 


THE   STORY   OF   THE   PRAIRIES. 


ridge  has  been  mostly  washed  away  by  the  stream,  in  this  picture.  A 
hill,  or  pile  of  boulders  and  broken  bits  of  rock,  lies  between  the  two 
places  where  the  water  emerges.  Morainic  boulders,  angular  fragments 
and  gravel  are  strewn  about  in  the  foreground. 

In  Figure  19  is  shown  a  large  boulder-strewn  moraine  formed  by  a 
glacier  which  once  occupied  a  valley  at  the  left  of  the  picture,  that  is, 
the  glacier  had  its  end  or  terminus  at  the  moraine  shown  in  the  picture, 
the  ice  moving  down  the  valley  from  the  left  toward  the  right.  The 
moraine  extends  from  the  foot  of  the  mountain  at  the  extreme  left  across 
the  valley  toward  the  right.  The  glacier  has  melted  back  or  retreated  so 
that  the  moraine  is  left  as  a  mark  of  its  former  greatness.  The  snow-field 
from  which  the  glacier  comes  is  among  the  crags  shown  in  the  back- 
ground of  Figure  12. 

The  houses  which  stand  on  the  moraine  are  what  are  called  "Seth- 
ers" — summer  dwellings  used  while  grazing  herds  in  these  mountain 
regions  during  the  warmer  months  of  the  year.  The  house  at  the  left 
is  used  as  a  tourists'  hotel. 


FIG.  19.    An  Old  Moraine.    Photograph  by  A.  Thorson. 


THE    STORY    OF    THE    PRAIRIES. 


110  Lontflu 


Map  Showing  Great  Ice  Sheet  of  North  America.    After  U.  S.  Geological  Survey. 
FIG.  19a 


CHAPTER    THE    FIFTH. 
THE  GREAT  ICE-SHEET  IN  NORTH  DAKOTA. 

The  Dakota  Glacier  and  Its  Moraines.— The  landscape  of  North  Da- 
kota is  marked  by  many  hills  similar  to  those  made  by  the  alpine 
glaciers  of  Norway,  only  our  hills  are  grown  over  with  grass  like  the 
old  moraine  in  Figure  19.  Just  as  the  hills  we  saw  bordering  the  ice 
were  made  of  materials  brought  down  by  the  ice  and  left  where  it 
melted,  so  our  hills  are  morainic  hills  deposited  by  the  ice  of  a  greater 
glacier. 

This  great  glacier  was  a  lobe  of  the  Great  North  American  Ice- 
Sheet.  There  were  several  large  lobes  along  the  southern  edge  of  the 
Continental  Ice-Sheet,  but  the  lobe  which  covered  our  State,  which  is 
known  as  the  Dakota  Glacier,  interests  us  most.  A  similar  lobe  pushed 
its  way  across  Minnesota  and  as  far  south  as  central  Iowa.  This  is 
known  as  the  Minnesota  Glacier. 

The  position  of  these  two  lobes  or  glaciers  and  their  relation  to 
each  other  and  to  the  Great  Ice-Sheet  from  which  they  pushed  out,  and 
of  which  they  were  a  part,  is  shown  in  Figure  20.  The  moraine  forming 
at  the  edge  is  that  of  the  Ninth  or  Leaf  Hills  stage.  The  position  of 
this  moraine  and  the  others  in  the  State  are  shown  on  the  Map, 
Figure  i. 

The  moraines  in  North  Dakota  which  are  most  important  are  the 
•  terminal  moraines.  They  extend  across  the  State  in  a  generally  north- 
northwest  and  south-southeast  direction.  Sometimes  a  moraine  is  a 
ridge  or  single  range  of  hills  and  sometimes  it  is  a  belt  of  hills,  hollows 
and  ridges  from  one  to  several  miles  wide.  The  hills  of  a  moraine  may 
be  high,  sometimes  becoming  150  to  200  feet  above  the  hollows  at  their 
bases,  and  they  are  sometimes  merely  low  swells  on  the  prairie. 

Lakes  are  a  feature  of  a  morainic  landscape.  A  dozen,  a  score,  half 
a  hundred,  may  occur  in  a  single  township.  Plymouth  Township  in 
Massachusetts  is  said  to  have  360  lakes.  Such  lakes  fill  the  hollows 
which  are  deep  enough  to  receive  more  water  than  can  evaporate. 

The  region  which  lies  between  two  moraines  is  most  commonly 


48 


THE   STORY   OF   THE   PRAIRIES. 


ground-moraine,  that  is,  boulders,  gravel,  sand  and  clay,  which  were 
shoved  and  pushed  along  the  bottom  of  the  glacier  and  run  over  and 
ground  up.  But  often  a  terminal  moraine  blends  with  the  ground- 
moraine  so  that  it  is  difficult  to  say  where  one  begins  and  the  other 
ends. 

Generally  the  land  between  moraines,   or  between  the  belts  and 
ridges  of  the  same  moraine,  is  good  farming  land,  and  is  what  is  com- 


G.V.*  GOLDEN  VALLEY   E.V.  =  ELK  VALLEY    E.VD.  -  ELK  VALLEY  BELTA 

FIG.  20.     Dakota  and  Minnesota  Glaciers.     From  a  Drawing 
by  Prof.  Thomas  H.  Grosvenor. 

monly  called  the  "rolling  prairie."  Shallow  lakes  often  occur  on  these 
rolling  lands,  caused,  like  the  lakes  among  the  hills  and  ridges  of  a 
moraine,  by  more  water  collecting  in  the  low  clay-bottomed  places  than 
can  evaporate.  Many  "alkali  lakes'"  are  such  "pans"  from  which  dur- 
ing dry  seasons  the  water  evaporates  leaving  the  white  alkaline  min- 
erals which  were  dissolved  from  the  soil,  forming  a  white  crust  over  the 
bottom. 


THE   GREAT  ICE-SHEET   IN   NORTH   DAKOTA.  49 

Lateral  and  medial  moraines  do  not  so  much  concern  us  in  North 
Dakota,  because  they  cannot  generally  be  distinguished  from  terminal 
moraines.  The  series  of  long  hills  known  as  "The  Ridge"  and  "The 
Mountains,"  which  lies  between  Larimore  and  Edinburg,  shown  in 
Figure  20,  is  a  medial  moraine  formed  between  two  great  lobes  or  glaciers 
of  the  ice-sheet. 

Do  not  forget  that  each  moraine  or  belt  of  hills  means  that  here  was 
the  edge  of  the  glacier  at  one  time;  that  these  hills,  all  the  gravel  and 
boulders,  all  the  clay  and  sand,  of  which  they  are  composed,  were  de- 
posited from  the  melting  of  the  ice  at  or  near  the  glacier's  edge.  It 
should  also  be  borne  in  mind  that  the  melting  of  a  great  mass  of  ice 
means  that  a  large  amount  of  water  must  find  escape  somewhere. 
These  ice-waters  formed  large  rivers  which  flowed  away,  making  great 
channels  with  their  mighty  currents,  and  carrying  down  their  courses 
gravel,  sand  and  fine  silt.  Many  lakes  also  were  formed  along  the  edge 
of  the  glacier  from  waters  pouring  off  from  the  ice  and  from  under- 
neath it. 

The  marks  of  these  glacial  rivers  and  lakes  are  now  plainly  seen 
upon  our  prairie  landscapes.  Broad  valleys  with  steep  and  high  banks 
are  seen  in  many  parts  of  our  State,  and  these  often  have  only  a  tiny, 
meandering  brooklet  threading  its  way  over  the  broad,  level  bottom. 
And  sometimes  there  is  no  stream  at  all  in  such  a  valley. 


l> 

D  ^V^-= 

o  o 


FlG.  21.     Cross  Section  of  the  Valley  of  a  Glacial  Stream. 

The  great  Sheyenne  Valley  is  one  of  the  most  notable  examples  of 
this  kind,  and  one  of  the  grandest  in  all  the  Northern  States.  It  re- 
quires no  great  effort  of  the  imagination  to  see  that  the  present  small 
and  slow-flowing  Sheyenne  River  did  not  make  the  great  valley  in  the 
bottom  of  which  the  river  now  flows. 

Many  broad,  fertile  prairies,  a  little  lower  than  the  surrounding  roll- 
ing prairie,  and  having  hills  alongside  and  not  very  far  distant,  may  be 
the  place  where  has  been  a  sheet  of  ice-water  from  the  melting  glacier 


50  THE   STORY   OF   THE   PRAIRIES. 

— a  temporary  glacial  lake.  The  richness  of  the  soil  on  such  prairies  is 
often  due  to  the  fact  that  waters  flowing  into  the  lake  carried  fine  silt 
or  rock-flour  and  deposited  it  over  the  bottom  of  the  lake.  This  tem- 
porary lake  disappeared  after  its  supply  of  water  from  the  melting  ice 
ceased.  Sometimes,  howrever,  a  pond  or  marsh  remains  as  a  vestige  of 
the  larger  lake. 

The  Dakota  Glacier  flowed  south  and  a  little  east  from  the  direction 
of  Lake  Manitoba  and  the  region  west  of  Lake  Winnipeg,  and  at  the 
time  of  its  greatest  extent  reached  across  North  and  South  Dakota. 
The  Dakota  Lobe  and  a  part  of  the  Minnesota  Lobe  at  a  later  stage, 
when  the  ice  had  melted  back  a  long  way,  is  shown  in  Figure  20.  When 
it  stood  at  the  position  shown  in  Figure  22  the  outermost  moraine, 
called  the  First  or  Altamont  Moraine,  was  formed,  along  the  edge  of 
the  ice.  On  the  west  side  of  the  lobe  was  formed  the  irregular  system 
of  hills  shown  in  Figure  i  crossing  the  State  through  Mclntosh,  Logan, 
Emmons,  Kidder,  Burleigh,  McLean,  Ward  and  Williams  Counties. 

Across  the  State  from  Ashley  in  Mclntosh  County  (see  Map,  Figure 
i),  northeast  to  Park  River  in  Walsh  County,  a  line  would  cross  the 
ten  great  Terminal  Moraines  formed  by  the  Dakota  Lobe  or  Glacier 
of  the  Great  Ice-Sheet  in  North  Dakota.  These  moraines  have  been 
named  in  their  order  from  the  one  first  formed  at  the  outer  edge  of  the 
glacier  to  the  one  far  to  the  north  in  Canada.  They  are  numbered  as 
well  as  given  geographic  names. 

The  outer  or  First  is  the  Altamont  Moraine,  the  name  meaning 
high  hills;  the  Second  or  Gary  Moraine,  the  Third  or  Antelope,  the 
Fourth  or  Kiester,  the  Fifth  or  Elysian,  the  Sixth  or  Waconia,  the 
Seventh  or  Dovre,  the  Eighth  or  Fergus  Falls,  the  Ninth  or  Leaf  Hills 
and  the  Tenth  or  Itasca.  The  Itasca  Moraine  was  formed  after  the  ice 
had  retreated  to  the  next  stage  after  that  represented  in  Figure  20.  The 
reader  need  not  try  to  remember  these  names.  They  are  given  here 
for  reference,  for  convenience  later.  The  names  are  geographic  names 
from  places  where  the  moraines  are  well  developed,  as  for  example  the 
Fergus  Falls  Moraine  is  named  from  the  fact  that  the  city  of  Fergus 
Falls,  Minnesota,  stands  upon  this  moraine,  where  the  hills  are  very 
conspicuous.  The  names  have  no  more  meaning  than  the  names  of 
persons. 

Lakes  and  streams  of  ice-water  skirt  the  edge  of  the  glacier.  Great 
streams  also  poured  off  from  the  surface  of  the  ice  and  spread  out  upon 
the  ground  adjoining.  Much  gravel,  sand  and  finer  rock-powder  were 


THE   GREAT   ICE-SHEET   IN   NORTH   DAKOTA. 


51 


SMMKse  W  -« 

Sip  !:-'$, 

1^4^*1  ^  *''•  I  >^  -fei 

fift 

- 


m       •* 


52 


THE   STORY    OF   THE    PRAIRIES. 


washed  by  such  streams  from  the  ice-front  and  spread  as  "over-wash 
plains"  upon  the  land.  The  streams  cut  wide  and  deep  channels,  for 
the  waters  were  kept  at  flood  by  the  continued  melting  of  the  ice. 
When  the  ice  had  melted  of  course  the  streams  ceased  to  be,  but  their 
channels  were  left  and  they  mark  the  landscape  to-day  in  many  parts  of 
the  State. 

South  of  Devils  Lake  are  some  of  the  largest  hills  in  the  State. 
There  was  probably  a  large  range  of  hills  there  before  the  ice-sheet 


ICE  .SHEET 

AT  THE  TIME  Of 

THE  FORMATION  OF 

THE  OUTER  MORAINE 

IN  SOUTH  DAITOTA 


PIG.  23.     After  Todd. 

covered  the  country.    When  the  Dakota  Glacier  extended  across  North 
and  South  Dakota  these  hills  were  buried  in  the  ice. 

At  the  time  of  the  formation  of  the  Leaf  Hills  Moraine,  or  when 
the  Dakota  Glacier  reached  as  far  south  as  is  shown  in  Figure  20,  the  ice 
edge  stood  upon  the  hills  south  of  Devils  Lake,  not  being  deep  enough 
to  flow  over  them.  East  of  these  hills  it  pushed  farther  south.  The 
ice  of  the  Dakota  Glacier  moved  from  the  north  in  the  direction  of 
Lake  Manitoba  toward  the  south  and  a  little  east,  and  that  of  the 


THE   GREAT   ICE-SHEET   IN   NORTH   DAKOTA.  53 

Minnesota  Glacier  from  the  region  beyond  Lake  Superior  and  south  of 
Hudson's  Bay  toward  the  south  and  west.  The  two  lobes  of  the  Great 
Ice-Sheet  thus  met  along  the  Pembina  Mountain  highland.  It  was  in 
the  hollow  or  ice  valley  between  the  lobes  that  the  Glacial  Elk  River 
flowed,  at  first  probably  on  the  top  of  the  ice,  and  later  formed  what 
is  now  known  as  the  Elk  Valley.  It  was  this  great  glacial  river  which 
carried  down  the  sand  and  finer  rock-flour  which  made  the  Elk  Valley 
Delta,  from  about  McCanna  and  Larimore  south  to  Portland. 

The  Work  Done  by  Moving  Ice.— Let  us  now  inquire  as  to  the  effect 
of  a  great  moving  mass  of  ice  upon  the  land-surface  it  passes  over.  If 
there  are  rough  places  on  the  rock  surface  these  will  be  ground  off  and 
smoothed,  and  the  fragments  which  are  torn  away  will  be  shoved  or 
carried  along  with  the  moving  mass.  The  rubbing  of  the  moving  ice 


FIG.  24.    A  Small  Hill  Being  Planed  Down  by  the  Ice. 

serves  to  give  a  peculiar  polish  to  the  stones  carried  in  it.  Such 
smoothed  and  polished  rocks  are  very  common  among  glacial  gravels 
and  boulders.  In  fact,  nearly  all  the  boulders  in  the  fields  are  smooth, 
at  least  the  sharp,  angular  corners  have  been  rounded,  and  many  of 
them  are  distinctly  polished.  It  is  common  also  to  find  boulders  and 
pebbles  not  only  smoothed  but  having  straight  lines  cut  in  their  sur- 
faces. These  lines  have  been  caused  by  the  stone  being  shoved  against 
another  hard  rock.  Boulders  or  pebbles  having  marks  made  in  this 
manner  are  said  to  be  "striated,"  and  the  fine  lines  or  furrows  are  called 
"striae." 

Boulders  or  fragments  which  are  carried  or  shoved  along  the  bot- 
tom of  the  ice  upon  a  hard  rock  floor  will  indeed  receive  severe  treat- 
ment. Not  only  will  their  rough  corners  be  ground  off,  but  any  except 
those  which  are  very  hard  will  be  likely  to  be  ground  to  powder.  Much 


54 


THE   STORY   OF   THE   PRAIRIES. 


FIG.  25.     Showing  Formation  of  Moraine,  and  Stratification  of  the  Ice 
Photograph  by  Prof.  T.  C.  Chamber  tin. 


FIG.  26.     Showing  Moraine,  which  is  being  Crowded  upon  by  the  Moving  Ice. 
Photograph  by  Prof.  T.  C.  Chamber -tin. 


THE   GREAT   ICE-SHEET   IN   NORTH   DAKOTA. 


FIG.  27.    A  Striated  and  Polished  Boulder.    Photograph  by  M.  B.  Erickson. 

of  the  clay  of  our  fields  is  rock-flour  thus  ground  by  the  great  glacier- 
mill. 

While  these  rock  fragments  which  are  carried  along  by  the  moving 
ice  are  being  thus  ground  to  powder,  what  is  the  effect  upon  the  under- 
lying bed-rock?  It  must  be  getting  a  pretty  hard  scouring!  Figure 
29  is  a  photograph  of  striae  on  a  surface  of  hard  quartzite  rock  in  South 
Dakota.  If  a  hummock  or  little  hill  lies  in  the  path  of  the  glacier,  and  if 
its  width  and  height  are  SO'  great  that  it  cannot  be  broken  off,  then 
the  ice  will  surround  it  and  flow  over  it.  The  hummock  will  be  combed 
and  rasped  by  the  ice  and  by  the  pieces  of  rock  which  are  being  car- 
ried in  it.  If  the  hummock  should  withstand  the  harsh  treatment,  when 
the  glacier  disappears  by  melting  and  leaves  the  once  ice-covered  land- 
scape, the  little  hill  or  hummock  may  look  something  like  A — Figure  30 

— or  like  B — Figure  30 — the  ice  having  moved  in  the  direction  of  the 
arrows. 

•    The  Turtle  Mountains  furnish  a  good  example  in  our  own  State  of 
a  large  and  broad  "hill"  which  was  covered  by  the  ice  and  "veneered." 


FIG.  28.    Granite  Pebble,  Showing  Ice  Planing  and  Striae.    Drawn  by  Miss  Jessie  Dawson. 


56 


THE   GREAT   ICE-SHEET   IN   NORTH   DAKOTA. 


57 


FlG.  30.     Hills  Worn  Down  by  Action  of  the  Ice. 

The  "Mountains,"   so-called,  really  are  not  mountains  at  all,  but  a 
plateau.     Before  the  ice-invasion  this  plateau  looked  something  like  A 

—Figure  31 — standing  upon  the  prairie  like  a  great,  broad  biscuit  on  a 
table  or  floor.  After  the  ice  had  passed  over  it,  it  looked  more  like  B 

—Figure  31 — which  is  about  as  it  appears  to-day.  The  steep  side  at  the 
left  is  near  Bottineau  and  the  section  extends  northeast  across  the  In- 
ternational Boundary. 

Devils  Heart    Hill    and    Sully's    Hill    south    of    Devils    Lake    are 
"veneered"  hills.     East  of  the  Missouri  River  many  long  hills  with 


FlG.  31.     Ideal  Sections  of  the  Turtle  Mountain  Plateau,  A  before,  and  B  after,  being  Cro&be d 

by  the  Ice-sheet. 

smooth  outlines  have  a  core  of  stratified  rock,  but  have  been  combed 
across  by  the  ice  and  strewn  with  boulders  and  finer  glacial  gravel  and 
sand,  and  so  are  "veneered"  with  drift. 

The  great  fertility  of  the  Red  River  Valley  and  the  eastern  part  of 
our  State  comes  not  alone  from  the  fact  that  the  land  in  the  Valley 


58  THE   STORY   OF   THE   PRAIRIES. 

was  once  covered  by  a  lake,  but  we  have  inherited  a  large  amount  of 
limestone,  in  the  form  of  soil,  from  the  limestone  beds  in  western  Mani- 
toba. This  limestone  has  been  ground  to  powder  by  the  ice  as  it  shoved 
it  along.  We  have  noticed  that  the  Dakota  Glacier  moved  south  and 
a  little  east  from  the  region  about  Lake  Manitoba  west  of  Winnipeg. 
This  gave  the  Red  River  Valley  and  the  eastern  portion  of  the 
State  a  valuable  "shipment"  of  the  best  wheat-producing  limestone 
soil  from  our  neighboring  Province  to  the  north.  This  pulverized  and 
ground  limestone  is  the  best  and  most  fertile  known  for  wheat  grow- 
ing- 
Advance  and  Retreat  of  the  Ice  Front. — In  the  chapter  on  the  Glaciers 

of  Norway  something  was  said  about  the  advancing  or  pushing  ahead 
of  the  front  of  a  glacier  due  to. the  movement  of  the  ice  being  greater 
than  the  melting,  and  again  the  ice  melting  away  more  rapidly  than  it 
flowed  down,  causing  a  retreating  or  moving  backward  of  the  edge  of 


3 

FIG.  32.    A  Veneered  Hill,  Ideal  Section  of  Mauvais  or  Big  Butte. 


the  glacier.  We  may  now  apply  what  we  saw  then  to  the  great  Con- 
tinental Glacier. 

If  melting  were  for  a  season  more  rapid  than  the  onward  movement 
of  the  ice,  then  the  edge  of  the  ice  would  slowly  retire  backward  and 
leave  its  supply  of  earth,  sand,  gravel,  boulders  and  clay  to  show  where 
it  had  been.  If  the  edge  had  stood  for  some  time  at  one  place  there 
would  be  a  long  heap  or  ridge  of  materials  forming  what  has  been 
called  a  moraine.  If  the  ice  melted  back  somewhat  rapidly  there  would 
be  scattered  boulders,  gravel,  sand  and  clay  over  the  area  between  the 
moraine  and  the  ice  front.  If  the  forward  movement  of  the  ice  and 
the  melting  should  now  balance  for  a  time  so  that  the  ice  front  became 
stationary  again,  here  would  be  formed  another  morainic  ridge. 

If  this  should  occur  again,  this  formation  of  a  moraine  would  be 


THE   GREAT   ICE-SHEET   IN   NORTH   DAKOTA.  59 

repeated,  and  so  there  might  come  to  be  a  series  of  morainic  ridges 
more  or  less  nearly  parallel  to  each  other.  If,  however,  the  ice  should 
move  ahead  more  rapidly  than  it  melted  away  at  the  front,  the  ice 
would  O'verride  these  ridges,  leveling  them  down  and  pushing  their 
materials  .along.  This  melting  back  and  pushing  ahead  have  occurred  a 
great  many  times,  as  a  study  of  the  terminal  moraines  of  our  State  and 
of  other  Northern  States  show.  Such  advance  and  retreat  of  the  ice 
front  would  tend  to  cause  the  terminal  moraine  to  become  not  a  simple 
line  or  long  heap  of  earth  and  stones,  but  a  belt  of  such  materials.  And 
as  not  all  the  earth  and  rock  of  the  hills  and  ridges  would  be  shoved 
along  in  front  of  the  advancing  ice  but  would  be  run  over  by  the  ice, 
the  depth  of  the  material  in  a  moraine-belt  becomes  often  very  great, 
and  so  much  material  piled  up  in  front  of  the  ice  would  act  as  a  dam 
to  the  on-flowing  ice  and  hinder  its  advance. 

The  terminal  moraines  which  mark  the  places  where  the  edge  of 
the  Great  Ice-Sheet  stood  are  not  merely  ridges  of  earth  and  rocks, 
but  are  belts  of  ridges  and  hills. 

The  hills  may  be  of  all  sizes  and  all  heights  up  to  150  feet  or  even 
200  feet.  Between  theni  are  little  hollows  and  large  hollows,  "kettles," 
they  have  been  called,  sometimes  containing  water,  sometimes  dry, 
and  sometimes  what  have  been  lakes  have  given  place  to  marshes  or 
"hay-meadows"  by  the  blowing  in  of  dust  and  the  continued  growth  of 
rushes  and  water  plants  till  the  lake  has  been  filled.  Sometimes  the 
hills  are  long,  graceful  swells,  and  sometimes  their  sides  are  very  steep. 
So  also  the  hollows  may  be  round  or  they  may  be  elongated  and  irregu- 
lar, and  they  may  be  deep  or  shallow.  Sometimes  the  hillsides  are 
strewn  thickly  with  boulders,  and  sometimes  no  pebble  larger  than  a 
toy  marble  can  be  found. 

Figure  33  is  a  photograph  taken  in  "The  Hills"  southwest  of  Minot 
in  Ward  County.  Boulders  are  seen  scattered  in  abundance  over  the 
hills.  In  the  foreground  is  a  patch  of  boulders  which  have  been 
brought  together  from  far  away.  Limestones,  granites  and  quartzites 
are  here  side  by  side.  The  limestones  came  from  over  in  Manitoba, 
perhaps  a  hundred  miles  away.  The  granites  and  hard  quartzites  may 
have  come  from  much  farther  away,  possibly  200  miles  or  more.  Such 
boulders  have  sometimes  been  traced  back  to  their  parent  ledges  over  a 
distance  of  more  than  300  miles. 

The  hill  at  the  right  where  the  carriage  stands  is  one  of  the  highest, 
if  not  the  highest,  in  this  section  of  the  State.  It  can  be  seen  from 


60 


THE   STORY   OF   THE   PRAIRIES. 


more  than  twenty  miles  distant  on  the  prairie.  Many  lakes  of  small 
size  and  hay-sloughs  can  be  seen  from  its  crest.  The  smoke  rising 
from  the  chimneys  of  the  shops  at  Minot  can  be  seen  also  twenty  miles 
away.  To  the  left  of  the  centre  of  the  picture  is  a  small  circular  lake 
now  nearly  filled  so  that  it  is  a  marsh.  Two  others  can  be  seen,  one  at 
the  right  and  one  at  the  left  on  the  margin  of  the  picture.  These  are 
the  "meadows"  from  which  the  ranchmen  get  their  supplies  of  hay 
during  summers  when  there  is  not  too  much  rain.  They  are  lakes  dur- 
ing wet  seasons. 

If  we  imagine  that  the  ice  pushed  ahead,  leaving  its  burden  of  earth 
and  stones  and  then  in  turn  melted  more  rapidly  so  that  the  edge  of  the 


FIG. 


In  the  Hills  Southwest  of  Minot. 


ice  was  farther  back;  and  if  we  imagine  that  it,  so  to  speak,  stood  still 
here  for  some  time  so  as  to  leave  another  mass  of  earth  and  stones;  and 
if  again  the  ice  should  advance  and  plough  through  and  over  the  nearer 
masses  of  morainic  material,  and  this  process  should  be  repeated  again 
and  again,  when  the  ice  should  have  finally  all  disappeared  and  left  the 
landscape  to  become  covered  with  plants  and  trees,  we  should  expect 
that  a  very  rough  and  hilly  landscape  would  be  the  result.  And  if,  as 
has  been  suggested,  the  materials  piled  up  at  the  ice  edge  stood  in  the 
way  of  the  forward  movement  of  the  ice,  the  tongues  of  ice  would  push 
out  where  there  was  less  material  in  the  way,  and  this  would  help  to 
form  the  irregularities  such  as  we  now  see  in  terminal  moraines. 


CHAPTER    THE    SIXTH. 
MORE   EXCURSIONS. 

Shore  Boulder  Chains. — We  may  now  understand  better  perhaps  why 
the  soil  changes  in  character  so  much  in  going  short  distances.  A 
farm  may  be  located  in  a  rnorainic  region  and  its  soil  be  stony,  gravelly 
or  sandy,  or  all  of  these,  and  it  may  be  very  hilly  and  rough,  with  small 
lakes  or  sloughs  and  marshes.  Another  farm  only  half  a  mile  away, 
or  even  only  a  few  rods  distant,  may  be  nearly  level,  of  fine  black 
loamy  soil,  and  almost  entirely  free  from  stones.  Still  another  may 
have  a  gentle  slope  or  undulating  surface,  with  almost  no  stones,  but 
the  soil  may  be  very  sandy,  so  that  when  the  wind  blows  it  may  drift 
into  dunes  or  heaps  of  sand.  The  first  farm  may  be  on  what  was  the 
land  barrier  or  moraine  which  hemmed  in  a  temporary  lake  on  one 
side;  the  second,  where  was  once  the  deep  water  of  the  lake  and  hence 
received  the  fine  sediments ;  and  the  third  may  be  on  what  was  a  delta  in 
the  lake. 

Sometimes  again  a  chain  of  boulders  may  lie  in  great  collections 
along  some  parts  of  a  farm  or  section  of  land,  and  other  parts  near  by 
be  entirely  free  from  such  boulders.  Such  chains  of  rocks  are  often  seen 
along  the  shores  of  lakes,  especially  of  lakes  whose  waters  are  shallow. 
During  cold  "winters  such  lakes  freeze  to  their  bottoms.  And  lakes 
which  are  deeper  in  some  parts  and  so  do  not  freeze  to  their  bottoms 
will  freeze  to  their  bottoms  in,  the  more  shallow  parts  nearer  shore. 
If  rocks  and  boulders  are  lying  on  the  bottom,  these  become  frozen 
into  the  ice.  The  sheet  of  ice  cracks  and  breaks  during  the  winter  and 
the  cracks  become  filled  with  water  and  this  freezes  and  in  freezing  ex- 
pands, and  so  the  ice  sheet  covering  the  whole  lake  becomes  larger 
and  it  therefore  shoves  outward  upon  the  shore.  In  so  doing  the 
bl-jcks  of  stone  and  boulders  which  were  frozen  into  the  bottom  of  the 
ice  are  shoved  toward  shore  with  the  ice.  This  not  only  moves  them 
a  little  way  shoreward,  but  it  serves  also  to  loosen  them  from  the  bot- 
tom. When  the  ice  "breaks  up,"  in  the  spring,  these  rocks  will  be 
carried  with  the  floating  ice  cakes  until  by  melting  of  the  ice  they  are 
again  dropped.  Whichever  way  the  prevailing  winds  bk>w  the  ice 


62 


THE   STORY   OF  THE   PRAIRIES. 


cakes  will  tend  to  be  moved  and  the  rocks  with  them.  The  result  is 
that  the  boulders  are  moved  toward  the  shore  in  the  direction  of  the 
prevailing  wind.  Winter  after  winter  they  are  caught  by  the  ice  and 
shoved  and  carried  a  little  way  toward  shore.  Finally  they  are  stranded 
along  the  bottom  near  the  shore.  Then  they  are  frozen  in  and  shoved 
up  on  the  shore  by  the  expansion  process  spoken  of  until  finally  there  is 
a  great  chain  of  rocks  and  boulders  piled  along  the  shore,  shoved  up 
above  the  water's  edge  and  left  there  by  the  melting  of  the  ice.  Hence 
if  often  happens  that  there  is  a  great  shore  chain  of  rocks  piled  along 
the  windward  shore  of  a  lake,  as  though  they  had  been  hauled  there 
and  dumped  by  some  titanic  force.  Such  chains  of  boulders  were 
sometimes  piled  along  the  shores  of  glacial  lakes,  and  when  these  lakes 
disappeared  and  the  lake  bottom  became  a  dry  field  here  were  left  the 
boulders  to  mark  where  once  had  been  the  lake. 

Boulder-Strewn  Prairies. — There  are  many  places  where  boulders  of 
all  sizes  are  scattered  over  the  land  in  great  numbers.  Great  blocks 
weighing  many  tons  often  lie  upon  the  prairie  as  though  they  had  been 
dropped  there  by  some  gigantic  force.  Sometimes  the  land  is  strewn 
with  boulders  so  that  one  can  walk  for  a  considerable  distance  with- 
out stepping  upon  soil  at  all.  Large  and  small  sizes,  and  different 
kinds,  granites,  quartzites,  limestones  and  others,  appear  as  though 
they  had  been  carried  there  and  thrown  down. 

Just  how  these  boulders,  these  huge  masses  and  the  smaller  blocks, 


FIG.  34.     A  Huge  "  Foreigner."     Photograph  by  Prof.  Chas.  M.  Hall. 


MORE   EXCURSIONS.  63 

came  to  be  distributed  just  as  we  now  find  them  we  need  not  now 
trouble  ourselves  about,  only  to  observe  that  they  are  all  "drift"  boul- 
ders or  "foreigners,"  and  that  they  have  been  transported  from  some 
other  place  by  the  great  ice-sheet,  and  when  the  ice  melted  they  were 
left  just  where  the  ice  happened  to  drop  them.  Their  corners  are 
nearly  always  rounded  and  their  surfaces  smoothed  by  the  rubbing  and 
grinding  of  the  great  ice-mill  in  which  they  were  carried. 

Buffalo  Boulders, — It  quite  frequently  happens  that  a  large  boulder 
lies  in  the  center  of  a  small  basin  or  hollow,  as  though  the  basin  had 
been  dug  around  the  rock.  Such  hollows  are  usually  not  large,  ex- 
tending only  a  few  feet  each  way  from  the  stone.  This  has  suggested 
the  idea  that  buffalo,  wandering  in  herds  over  the  once  unbroken 
prairie,  rubbed  their  bodies  against  the  sides  of  the  rock,  and  in  tread- 
ing about  it  ploughed  up  the  soil.  Loose  soil  is  easily  carried  by  the 
wind,  and  so  the  hollow  might  easily  have  been  formed  by  the  joint 
action  of  the  hoofs  of  the  buffalo  and  the  wind. 

The  rocks  are  sometimes  polished  on  their  sides  with  a  sort  of 
greasy  polish,  but  no  such  thing  is  seen  on  the  tops  of  the  boulders 
beyond  the  reach  of  the  animals'  heads. 

Sometimes  when  these  hollows  become  quite  deep,  or  are  on  low 
ground,  water  collects  in  them  during  wet  seasons  and  they  become 
"buffalo  wallows."  When  this  is  the  case  the  soil  would  be  carried  away 
on  the  bodies  of  the  animals. 

Stratified  Gravel  and  Sand  in  Sand-Pits. — Probably  all  have  seen  a 
gravel-  or  sand-pit.  Here  the  little  fragments  of  stone  we  call  gravel 
or  sand  are  arranged  in  beautiful  layers,  one  above  another  like  the 
boards  in  a  lumber  pile.  Some  of  the  layers  are  very  thin,  perhaps  only 
a  small  fraction  of  an  inch  in  thickness,  and  again  they  are  several 
inches  thick,  or  even  several  feet.  Occasionally,  also,  a  boulder  is  found 
imbedded  in  the  layers.  The  size  of  the  particles  in  any  particular  layer 
or  stratum  it  is  noticed  is  about  the  same,  though  the  next  layer  above 
or  below  may  be  much  finer  or  coarser.  If  we  follow  the  line  o<f  one 
layer  either  wray  for  some  distance  we  may  notice  that  in  some  cases  it 
becomes  coarser  as  we  proceed,  or  it  may  become  finer;  and  many 
times  \ve  see  that  a  layer  becomes  thinner  and  thinner  in  one  direction 
and  finally  ceases  entirely. 

When  we  attempt  to  picture  to  our  minds  the  way  in  which  this 
gravel  mass  came  to  be  here,  remembering  that  each  of  these  grains  of 
sand  and  gravel,  however  small,  and  every  boulder  and  cobble,  was 

5 


t)4r  THE   STORY   OF  THE   PRAIRIES. 

once  a  part  of  a  larger  rock,  that  these  tiny  bits  are  wrhat  is  left  of  huge 
rock-masses  torn  or  broken  from  ledges  somewhere,  and  brought  here 
and  left  as  we  now  find  them  by  some  process,  we  shall  no  longer  simply 
wonder  how  these  things  came  to  be,  but  will  try  to  definitely  explain 
them. 

WTe  have  seen  before  how  lakes  of  longer  or  shorter  duration  might 
be  formed  at  the  front  of  the  ice-sheet,  hemmed  in  by  masses  of  earth 


FIG.  35.     Section  in  a  Gravel  Pit,  Showing  Stratified  Sand  Below,  and  Coarse  Gravel  and 
Boulders  Above.     Photograph  by  Prof.  Chas,  M.  Hall. 

and  stone  outside  the  line  of  the  ice  front.  We  have  seen  how  streams 
flowing  into  such  lakes  would  carry  great  quantities  of  earth,  fine  silt 
or  rock-flour,  and  sand,  and  even  coarser  materials,  the  product  of  the 
great  ice-plow  on  the  rocks  over  which  it  has  passed.  We  have  seen  how 
such  lakes  might  have  deltas  formed  at  their  shores  and  reaching  out  over 
their  bottoms,  and  how  finer  sediments  would  be  scattered  all  over  their 
bottoms,  and  how  they  might  finally  become  entirely  filled.  We  have 
seen  that  these  lakes  might  be  of  all  sizes,  from  mere  ponds  to  deep  and 
broad  bodies  of  water  manv  miles  in  extent.  The  streams  which  flow 


MORE   EXCURSIONS.  65 

into  them  may  be  few  and  small,  or  they  may  be  many,  and  large  as 
well  as  small.  They  may  flow  with  swift  or  slow  ^currents,  and  may 
carry  coarse  or  fine  materials,  according  to  what  materials  were  in  the 
ice  and  the  speed  with  which  the  current  flowed,  for  a  swiftly-flowing 
stream  can  carry  a  great  deal  more  material  and  a  great  deal  larger 
fragments. 

Now,  let  us  suppose  that  the  ice  has  crowded  its  way  close  upon 
the  already  formed  terminal  moraine.  The  ice  front  stands  as  a  great 
wall,  maybe  100  feet  or  150  feet  or  1,000  feet  high.  The  melting 
causes  great  streams  of  water  to  flow  down  off  from  the  ice  and  out 
from  its  .base.  These  waters  flow  away  from  the  ice  as  fast  as  they 
can  find  a  way  to  escape  over  the  earth  and  stones.  Torrents  carrying 
earth,  sand  and  gravel  pour  their  dirty  waters  into  a  basin  filled  already 
with  water,  and  even  roll  cobbles  and  boulders  into  the  lake.  As  soon 
as  these  rapid  currents  enter  the  still  waters  of  the  lake  they  become 
slower  and  throw  down  their  burden  of  earthy  materials.  The  heavier 
particles  will  be  thrown  down  first,  then  the  lighter,  and  finally  farther 
from  shore  the  finest  of  all. 

Suppose  this  keeps  on  till  a  layer  of  gravel  or  sand  or  finer  silt  has 
been  formed,  an  inch  or  two  inches  or  even  more  in  thickness.  Mean- 
while the  ice  front  may  have  changed  its  position  or  form  by  movement 
of  some  part  of  its  mass,  or  by  melting,  or  both,  so  that  the  course  of 
the  stream  has  become  changed  and  hence  the  gathering  of  sediments 
carried  into  the  lake  will  be  changed.  Conditions  may  be  such  that 
sediments  will  not  be  carried  into  the  lake  at  the  same  places  as  before, 
and  so  the  layer  which  was  forming  on  the  bottom  may  not  be  added 
to,  but  other  parts  of  the  bottom  will  receive  the  sand  and  finer  sedi- 
ments, and  only  fine  silt  may  be  deposited  on  the  top  of  the  layer  of 
coarser  sand. 

Then  other  changes  may  cause  still  other  manner  of  distributing 
the  gravels,  sands  and  silts.  We  may  imagine  some  coarser  material 
being  left  as  a  third  layer.  The  incoming  currents  of  water  may  be- 
come more  swift  by  more  rapid  melting  of  the  ice  or  by  the  ice  of  the 
glacier  moving  in  such  way  as  to  cause  a  steeper  bed  to  the  water 
course,  and  hence  while  some  of  the  materials  already  thrown  down 
may  be  again  taken  up  and  carried  farther  along  into  the  lake  by  the 
swifter  currents  other  coarser  materials  now  being  carried  by  the 
swifter  streams  may  be  left  on  the  top  of  the  finer  layers  already  laid 
down,  so  that  now  there  are  four  layers  lying  one  above  another, 


66  THE   STORY   OF  THE   PRAIRIES. 

the  first  of  sand,  then  one  of  very  fine  rock-flour  or  silt,  then  a  coarser 
layer  again,  and  finally  another  layer  which  may  be  coarser  still  than 
the  last  or  it  may  be  finer,  according  as  the  waters  which  carried  it  were 
moving  more  swiftly  or  more  slowly  than  the  waters  which  carried  in 
the  last  layer  before. 

Now,  still  other  changes  may  occur  and  other  streams  may  flow  into 
the  lake  in  greater  abundance  in  some  other  parts  of  the  lake,  and  these 
streams  may  carry  still  different  materials.  But  coarser  materials  will 
be  dropped  nearer  the  shore  and  the  finer  carried  farther  out,  and  some 
of  these  may  be  scattered  over  the  layer  just  described,  the  fourth  in 
the  series,  and  so  a  fifth  layer  be  added.  And  a  sixth  and  a  seventh 
may  follow,  according  to  the  time  the  lake  remained  and  streams  con- 
tinued to  pour  in  their  muddy  and  sand-laden  waters.  The  thickness 
of  the  layers  depends  upon  the  changing  conditions  which  have  just 
been  noticed,  a  layer  of  coarse  sand  or  gravel  accumulating  more 
rapidly  than  a  layer  of  fine  silt. 

If  occasionally  a  boulder  occurs  imbedded  in  the  fine  layers  we  shall 
understand  that  even  large  rocks  may  be  rolled  and  even  carried  by 
streams  if  their  currents  are  very  swift.  Larger  and  smaller  boulders 
may  therefore  be  expected  to  be  found  imbedded  in  the  layers  of  gravel, 
sand  and  silt. 

The  coulees  or  young  valleys  and  the  larger  streams  which  are  now 
furnishing  sediment  to  fill  the  lakes,  and  many  other  changes  in  the 
appearance  of  the  landscape  surrounding  glacial  lakes,  including  the 
growing  of  grass  and  trees,  and  the  crumbling  of  rocks  by  action  of 
frost,  air  and  wind,  and  the  dissolving  of  soils  by  the  rains,  are  things 
which  have  occurred  since  the  ice  of  the  great  Ice-Sheet  disappeared 
to  return  no  more,  in  other  words,  these  are  what  are  called  post- 
glacial changes,  or  changes  which  have  occurred  since  the  Glacial 
Period. 

A  Hard  Problem  for  a  Boy  to  Understand. — It  is  not  an  easy  thing  to 
think  that  all  the  materials  of  the  fields,  the  sand,  gravel  and  larger 
rocks  of  the  hills,  all  the  materials  in  fact  of  which  the  landscape  for 
many  feet  below  the  surface  is  composed,  have  been  brought  from  some- 
where else,  are  transported  materials,  that  the  whole  top  of  the  earth,  as 
it  were,  has  been  shoved  in  from  outside,  has  been  brought  here  in  or 
on  or  under  the  ice.  This  seems  a  great  piece  of  fiction  perhaps  at 
first.  We  have  seen  earth  and  rocks  carried  by  ice,  but  not  on  such  a 
scale  as  would  amount  to  anything  like  the  great  covering  of  drift 


MORE   EXCURSIONS.  67 

which  overlies  the  bed-rock  over  the  greater  part  of  our  State,  and  over 
many  of  the  Northern  States.  Considerable  exercise  of  the  imagina- 
tion is  needed  to  realize  the  force  of  this  great  fact. 

A  young  man  once  brought  to  the  writer  a  stone  which  he  had 
found  in  the  earth  thrown  up  in  the  digging  of  a  well,  and  he  thought 
it  very  strange  that  there  was  what  he  called  a  "petrified  butterfly"  in 
the  stone!  His  face  wore  a  surprised  and  puzzled  look  while  a  few 
simple  things  were  explained  to  him  that  this  stone  was  a  "glacial" 
pebble,  that  the  "petrified  butterfly"  was  not  a  butterfly  at  all,  but  a 
fossil  form  of  a  sea  animal  which  had  long  ages  ago  lived  upon  the 
sea  bottom,  and  the  shell  of  the  little  animal  had  been  buried  there  in 
the  mud.  This  stone  had  once  been  part  of  that  mud.  In  the  lapse  of 
the  ages  the  ocean  had  disappeared  from  that  part  of  the  earth,  the  mud 
had  become  solid  rock,  and  when  the  great  Ice-Flood  spread  itself  over 
the  land  the  rock  in  which  this  little  animal  had  had  its  tomb  for  so 
long  was  broken  away  by  the  moving  ice  and  had  been  carried  here 
along  with  other  stones,  clay  and  soil,  and  the  fragment  of  rock  had 
been  dug  up  from  the  drift,  the  boulder  had  broken  to  pieces,  and  so 
here  was  the  "fossil"  remains  of  the  little  sea  animal! 

"A  sea  animal!"  he  exclaimed.  "Why,  it  was  nearly  a  thousand 
miles  from  the  ocean  where  I  found  this  piece  of  stone!" 

"Yes,  but  all  the  land,  all  the  solid  rocks  have  been  formed  from 
mud  in  the  bottom  of  the  ocean,  and  afterwards  the  ocean  bottoms 
have  become  dry  land,  and  the  muds  of  the  ocean  the  solid  rocks.  The 
ice  carried  the  stone  to  where  you  found  it  long  after  the  ocean  had 
gone." 

"The  ice  carried  it!"  he  exclaimed  again,  still  puzzled.  "That  seems 
to  me  a  pretty  big  story  to  believe,  for  it  was  down  more  than  twelve 
feet  in  the  ground  and  there  were  other  large  stones  above  it." 

Now,  to  the  reader  who  has  followed  these  pages,  it  is  hoped  that 
the  story  does  not  seem  "too  big"  to  be  understood.  It  is  hoped  that 
the  reader  is  able  to  understand,  after  reading  the  pages  of  this  book 
thus  far,  that  ice  spreading  and  flowing  over  the  land  in  a  vast  sheet 
could  have  carried  the  soil  of  the  fields,  the  rocks  and  clays  of  the  hills 
and  prairies,  and  that  in  this  way  is  explained  the  occurrence  of  large 
and  small  stones,  stones  of  many  kinds,  and  clay  and  sand,  all  in  a  great 
mixture,  making  up  our  landscape. 

When  we  try  to  picture  to  our  minds  the  distance  to  the  Moon,  to 
the  Sun  or  to  the  planet  Neptune,  we  cannot  without  some  effort  realize 


68 


THE   STORY   OF   THE   PRAIRIES. 


these  great  distances.  The  mind  cannot  at  first  readily  think  them. 
But  we  think  of  the  Sun  as  being  much  farther  away  than  the  Moon, 
and  Neptune  as  much  farther  away  than  the  Sun,  and  of  the  stars  as 
vastly  farther  distant  in  space  than  Neptune.  We  dwell  upon  the  fig- 
ures representing  those  great  distances,  and  finally  come  to  a  realiza- 
tion of  the  immensity  of  space  and  of  the  extent  of  the  great  universe. 
So  when  the  untutored  youth  tried  to  follow  the  thought  of  the  ex- 
planation of  the  stone  which  contained  the  "petrified  butterfly,"  the  sea 
animal  which  was  found  a  thousand  miles  from  the  ocean,  his  mind  was 
quite  unable  to  grasp  the  problem,  and  so  he  exclaimed,  "It  is  a  pretty 
big  story  to  believe !" 

To  the  minds  of  many  persons  who  have  not  trained  thei'r  imagina- 
tions to  an  enlarged  view  of  things  about  them ;  who  have,  it  may  be, 
never  asked  themselves  the  reason  why  rivers  run  in  valleys  or  why 
valleys  are  bounded  by  hills  or  whether  prairie  plains  must  some  time 
become  hilly  slopes ;  who  have  never  wondered  why  the  boulders  and 
gravel,  the  clay  and  soil  are  distributed  as  they  are,  such  an  explana- 
tion as  that  related  above  would  be  as  hard  to  understand  and  believe 
as  it  was  to  the  boy.  We  must  not  therefore  expect  to  grasp  the  full 
force  and  meaning  of  the  geological  story  of  our  own  neighborhood  or 
State  at  the  first  effort.  If  we  could  all  visit  the  great  ice  fields  of 
Greenland  and  look  upon  the  vast  ice  sheet,  see  the  great  promon- 
tories of  ice  standing  like  huge  walls  of  rock  as  high  above  the  ground 


FIG.  36.     A  Joint  Moraine  Formed  by  the  Meeting  of  two  Glaciers. 
Photograph  by  Prof.  T.  C.  Chamber lin. 


MORE   EXCURSIONS. 


69 


70  THE   STORY   OF   THE   PRAIRIES. 

in  front  of  them  as  would  be  measured  by  standing  three  of  the  highest 
church  spires  in. our  State  one  above  the  other;  if  we  could  look  upon 
the  great  masses  of  rock  which  are  being  carried,  shoved  and  broken, 
and  left  in  great  terminal  moraines;  if  we  could  walk  or  climb  upon  the 
top  of  the  great  slowly  moving  mass  of  ice;  if  we  could  behold  the 
great  expanse  of  snow  stretching  away  in  the  distance  and 
from  which  reach  out  towards  the  lower  regions  the  great  ice  tongues 
or  glaciers,  it  would  help  us  to  understand  the  meaning  of  a  great  Con- 
tinental Glacier  or  Ice-Sheet.  We  should  be  better  able  to  see  how  the 
stone  which  the  boy  found  in  the  well  digging  could  be  a  part  of  a  great 
mass  of  materials  which  had  been  carried  by  the  great  moving  ice-sheet 
from  the  regions  of  the  North.  The  hills  known  as  moraines,  of  which 
our  State  has  a  great  number,  would  then  be  more  easily  ^understood 
as  the  dumped  material  left  from  the  melting  of  the  ice. 

If  we  can  imagine  a  great  ice-sheet  many  times  larger  than  the 
great  ice-sheet  now  covering  Greenland  to  be  spread  over  two-thirds  of 
North  America,  and  instead  of  the  ice  having  a  depth  three  times  as 
great  as  the  height  of  the  highest  church  spire  you  have  seen,  we 
imagine  the  whole  country  to  be  covered  by  ice  to  a  depth  of  half  a 
mile  to  a  mile  or  more,  we  shall  be  still  better  able  to  understand  the 
meaning  of  the  landscape  with  its  hills  and  prairies,  lakes  and  marshes, 
boulders  and  sandy  plains. 


CHAPTER  THE  SEVENTH. 

NORTH  DAKOTA,  THE  OLD  AND  THE  NEW. 

Three  Types  of  Landscape. — North  Dakota  may  be  said  in  a  general 
way  to  have  three  kinds  of  topography  or  landscape  features:  first,  the 
level-prairie  portion,  which  is  almost  perfectly  flat,  and  is  almost  un- 
drained  by  streams;  second,  the  rolling-prairie  portion,  which  is  marked 
by  ranges  of  rounded  hills,  some  of  them  high,  and  many  small  lakes 
without  outlets ;  and,  third,  the  region  which  is  drained  by  streams  hav- 
ing well-established  courses,  many  high  hills  with  flat  tops  and  steep 
sides,  and  no  lakes. 

The  first  kind  of  landscape  includes  those  parts  of  the  State  which 
were  for  a  considerable  time  covered  by  large  bodies  of  water  during 
the  time  of  the  melting  of  the  ice  of  the  Great  Ice-Sheet.  There  are 
four  regions  in  the  State  which  belong  to  this  class.  These  are  the 
great  Red  River  Valley,  embracing  the  eastern  tier  of  counties  of  the 
State;  the  Mouse  River  Valley,  including  parts  of  Bottineau,  Ward, 
McHenry,  Pierce  and  Rolette  Counties;  a  small  area  in  the  southern 
part  of  the  State  extending  south  from  Oakes  and  embracing  the  east- 
ern part  of  Dickey  County;  and  a  region  covering  most  of  Sargent 
County,  and  a  part  of  Ransom. 

The  second  kind  of  landscape  includes  all  the  great  central  portion 
of  the  State  west  of  the  Red  River  Valley,  to  the  Missouri  River,  ex- 
cept the  Old  Lake  bottom  areas  just  mentioned. 

The  third  kind  of  landscape  includes  all  that  part  of  the  State  west 
of  the  Missouri  river,  and  includes  the  famous  region  known  as  the 
"Bad  Lands." 

There  are,  therefore,  the  Old  Lake  bottom  regions,  the  glaciated 
regions  which  have  not  been  covered  by  large  bodies  of  water,  and 
the  region  which  was  not  at  any  time  covered  by  the  ice  of  the  Great 
Ice-Sheet. 

The  Manitoba  Escarpment. — A  line  of  highland  extends  across  the  ' 
State  from  Pembina  Mountain  on  the  International  Boundary  south- 


72 


THE   STORY   OF  THE   PRAIRIES. 


ward  to  the  hills  known  as  the  Coteau  des  Prairies  near  the  southern 
boundary  of  the  State  in  southeastern,  Sargent  County,  near  Rutland 
and  Havana,  This  highland  continues  far  north  into  Canada,  and 
south  across  South  Dakota  and  into  southwestern  Minnesota.  The 
highest  part  of  the  highland  within  our  State  is  the  Pembina  Moun- 
tain, five  or  six  miles  south  of  the  International  Boundary  and  about 
five  miles  west  of  Walhalla.  It  forms  the  highland  which  rises  west  of 
Larimore  and  which  is  plainly  seen  from  the  passing  railway  train 
south  to  Northwood  and  Hatton,  on  the  Breckenridge  Division  of  the 
Great  Northern  Railway.  Farther  south  it  is  not  so  high.  Where  it  is 


\ 


FIG.  38.     Map  of  North  Dakota,  showing  the  Highlands. 
Drawing  by  Miss  M.  Emma  Davis. 


crossed  by  the  Northern  Pacific  Railway  west  of  Wheatland  it  is  only 
a  prairie  swell  fifteen  or  twenty  feet  high.  South  from  here  to  Havana 
it  continues  low,  but  rises  suddenly  at  Havana  into  the  high-hilly  region 
of  the  Coteau  des  Prairies. 

The  Coteau  du  Missouri. — More  than  one-third  of  the  State  of  North 
Dakota  is  embraced  in  what  is  known  as  the  Plateau  du  Coteau  du 
Missouri,  a  rather  large  name,  but  which  simply  means  the  hilly  upland 
plain  of  the  Missouri.  The  eastern  edge  of  this  great  plateau  rises 
quite  suddenly  300  to  400  feet  from  the  prairie  lands  eastward.  The 


NORTH  DAKOTA,  THE  OLD  AND  THE  NEW.  73 

line  of  the  eastern  edge  crosses  the  International  Boundary  near  the 
northwest  corner  of  the  State  in  Williams  County,  and  extends  in  a 
southeasterly  and  southerly  direction  across  the  State,  passing  fifteen 
or  eighteen  miles  west  of  Minot  in  Ward  county,  Dog  Den  Butte  in 
northern  McLean  County  and  Hawk's  Nest  in  southeastern  Wells 
County  being  outlying  hills  belonging  to  this  plateau ;  thence  it  runs  in 
a  more  southerly  course  about  ten  miles  west  of  Jamestown,  five  to 
eight  miles  west  of  Edgeley  in  western  Lamoure  County,  and  about 
fifteen  miles  west  of  Ellendale  in  Dickey  county.  The  whole  of  the 
Missouri  "slope,"  within  our  State,  lies  upon  this  great  plateau.  The 
eastern  part  of  the  plateau  is  the  watershed  between  the  Missouri 
River  and  the  rivers  draining  into  Hudson's  Bay, — the  Mouse,  the 
Sheyenne, — and  the  James  Rivers.  This  highland  extends  westward 
with  gradually  increasing  altitude  till  it  flanks  the,  Rocky  Mountains. 

The  Turtle  Mountains,  lying  upon  the  International  Boundary  about 
100  miles  east  of  the  edge  of  the  Coteau  du  Missouri,  belong  with  this 
great  plateau  geologically.  That  is,  the  Turtle  Mountains  were  once 
a  part  of  the  great  Missouri  plateau,  but  they  have  been  cut  off  by 
the  great  valley  which  now  lies  between — the  valley  of  the  Mouse 
River.  The  layers  of  rock  in  the  Turtle  Mountains  are  the  same  as 
those  in  the  larger  plateau,  and  the  strata  or  rock  layers  once  extended 
across  the  valley. 

We  see  therefore  that  there  is  a  general  rise  in  elevation  westward 
from  the  Red  River  of  the  North  on  the  eastern  boundary,  which  is 
951  feet  at  Wahpeton,  900  feet  at  Fargo,  835  feet  at  Grand  Forks, 
and  753  feet  at  Pembina,  to  an  altitude  above  sea-level  at  Buford,  near 
where  the  Yellowstone  River  enters  the  Missouri,  of  1,950  feet,  more 
than  2,400  feet  on  the  general  level  away  from  the  river,  and  west  of 
Sentinel  Butte  where  the  Northern  Pacific  Railway  crosses  the  State 
line,  2,810  feet.  • 

All  these  highlands,  except  the  region  west  of  the  Missouri  River, 
were  covered  by  the  ice  of  the  Great  Ice-Sheet,  the  western  limit  of  the 
ice  being  nearly  along  the  present  course  of  the  Missouri  River.  The 
vast  ice-sheet  by  its  melting  supplied  a  great  amount  of  water,  but  at 
the  same  time  those  streams  which  flowed  toward  the  north  were 
dammed  up  by  the  ice  so  that  lakes  accumulated  in  the  valleys  south 
of  the  ice-front  where  the  highlands  furnished  a  wall  to  hem  in  the 
waters.  The  waters  finally  were  compelled  to  find  escape  by  overflow- 
ing southward. 


74  THE   STORY   OF  THE   PRAIRIES. 

The  Manitoba  Escarpment  formed  a  highland  on  the  west  which 
prevented  the  escape  of  the  waters  of  Lake  Agassiz  into  the  James 
River  Valley.  Lake  Dakota,  of  which  the  northern  end  only  reached 
into  North  Dakota,  was  hemmed  in  by  those  same  highlands  on  the 
east  and  by  the  Coteau  du  Missouri  on  the  west,  lying  in  the  trough 
of  the  James  Valley  between  these  two  highlands.  This  trough  was 
the  valley  of  the  James  River  before  the  invasion  of  the  ice,  as  it  is 
now.  Lake  Souris  occupied  the  lowland  lying  between  the  Turtle 
Mountains  and  the  Coteau  du  Missouri,  extending  as  far  south  as 
Velva,  at  the  Ox-Bow  of  the  Mouse  River,  and  west  to  Minot  and  east 
to  Rugby. 

The  Missouri  River — It  is  natural  to  wonder  how  it  happened  that 
the  great  Missouri  River  should  flow  almost  exactly  along  where  the 
edge  of  the  Great  Ice-Sheet  was.  We  naturally  wonder  if  the  ice-sheet 
had  anything  to  do  with  causing  it;  and  when  we  notice  the  course 
of  the  upper  portion  of  the  river  from  far  west  in  Montana,  and  notice 
also  how  the  great  Yellowstone  River  enters  the  Missouri  at  Buford 
from  the  southwest  bringing  waters  north  from  the  Big  Horn  Moun- 
tains in  Wyoming,  and  still  again  observing  that  the  Little  Missouri 
River  flows  north  for  200  miles  from  the  Black  Hills  in  South  Dakota 
and  Wyoming,  finally  emptying  into  the  Big  Missouri;  and  when  we 
notice  what  a  great  elbow  or  bend  the  Missouri  makes,  turning  almost 
south  and  following  the  edge  of  the  drift-covered  region  all  the  way 
till  it  empties  into  the  Mississippi  at  St.  Louis,  we  are  almost  ready  to 
think  that  the  great  river  was  changed  from  its  old  course  and  com- 
pelled to  seek  a  new  one. 

The  direction  of  the  three  streams,  the  Upper  Missouri,  the  Yellow- 
stone, and  the  Little  Missouri,  is  toward  a  point  in  North  Dakota,  and 
suggests  that  they  may  have  once  flowed  toward  the  east  and  finally 
discharged  their  waters  into-  Hudson's  Bay  or  Lake  Superior.  Then 
add  to  this  that  when  the  ice-sheet  was  all  over  the  land  half  a  mile  or 
a  mile  deep  the  waters  would  be  prevented  from  flowing  east  or  north 
by  the  great  ice  wall,  and  so  their  waters  would  keep  flowing  down 
to  the  ice.  There  must,  therefore,  be  a  great  lake  formed  along  the 
ice  wall  where  these  streams  met  or  else  the  waters  must  escape  along 
the  edge  of  the  ice. 

The  melting  of  the  ice  along  the  edge  of  the  Glacier  caused  vast 
floods  of  water  which  would  add  to  that  of  the  rivers.  This  too  must 
escape.  So  it  seems  likely  that  a  stream  channel  came  to  be  formed 


NORTH  DAKOTA,  THE  OLD  AND  THE  NEW. 


75 


along-  the  edge  of  the  ice.  So  when  the  ice  finally  melted  away  the 
river  could  not  get  out  of  this  new  channel.  And  so  here  the  great 
Missouri  River  has  staid  ever  since. 

The  Ox-Bows  in  the  River  Courses — It  is  a  striking  fact  that  so  many 
of  the  streams  in  North  Dakota  make  a  bend  or  ox-bow  in  their  courses, 
curving  to  the  east  and  south  and  then  to  the  east  and  north.  A  nota- 
ble example  of  this  is  the  great  bend  or  ox-bow  of  the  Mouse  River. 
Another  is  the  big  bend  of  the  Sheyenne. 
And  when  we  look  at  a  map  of  the  State 
it  is  noticed  that  nearly  all  the  tributaries 
of  the  Red  River  of  the  North  flow  first 
south  and  east,  then  bend  around  to  the 
north  and  east. 

In  order  to  see  this  more  forcibly 
draw  a  heavy  line  on  a  sheet  of  paper  to 
represent  the  Red  River  of  the  North, 
and  then  draw  the  course  of  the  Sheyenne 
from  east  of  Devils  Lake  to  its  entrance 
into  the  Red  River  O'f  the  North  north  of 
Fargo.  Then  draw  the  Maple  River,  the 
Wild  Rice,  the  Goose  with  its  principal 
headwaters,  the  Turtle,  the  Forest  or 
Big  Salt,  the  Park,  the  Tongue,  and  the 
P'embina.  Notice  the  direction  of  the 
headwaters  of  the  Goose,  Turtle,  Forest, 
Park,  and  Tongue,  particularly.  Draw 
a  line  on  your  map  to  show  the  western 
shore  of  Lake  Agassiz.  Why  do  these 
streams  at  first  flow  in  a  southeasterly 
direction?  Because  the  highland  of  the 
Manitoba  Escarpment  is  higher  toward 
the  north  and  becomes  gradually  lower 
southward.  But  they  must  flow  east  also 
because  the  front,  or  edge,  of  the  highland 
slopes  rapidly  that  way.  But  why  do  they  so  soon  turn  toward  the 
north  after  getting  upon  the  Red  River  Valley  bottom  ?  Let  us  answer 
this  by  asking  whether  the  Red  River  Valley  is  higher  toward  the  north 
or  toward  the  south?  The  Red  River  flows  down  north.  It  is  easv 


FIG.  39.    The  Streams  of  the  Red  River 
Valley  all  make  a  Southward  Curve. 


76  THE   STORY   OF   THE   PRAIRIES. 

then  to  see  why  they  turn  toward  the  north  and  east  after  flowing  for 
some  distance  to  the  south  and  east. 

But  when  these  streams  first  started  they  emptied  into  Glacial 
Lake  Agassiz.  As  this  lake  grew  smaller  and  its  shores  became  farther 
*md  farther  east  from  the  foot  of  the  highland,  these  streams  followed 
;hc  retiring  waters  of  the  lake,  pushing  their  channels  along  over  the 
shore-sand  of  the  lake.  They  thus  came  to  have  a  direction  more  nearly 
east.  Finally  as  the  lake  gradually  grew  smaller,  and  sediments, 
deposited  along  the  central  axis  of  the  lake  where  now  runs  the  Red 
River,  blocked  the  way  of  the  streams,  they  turned  more  and  more 
northward.  Some  of  the  small  streams  between  Turtle  and  Forest 
Rivers  are  unable  to  get  to  the  Red  River  and  spread  out  into  marshes. 
Forest  River  nearly  suffers  this  fate,  but  escapes  toward  the  north 
after  spreading  out  into  a  lake  in  southern  Walsh  county. 

Many  Small  Lakes. — Lakes  are  always  found  in  a  region  of  country 
which  has  been  covered  by  the  ice.  They  are  commonly  small  and 
without  outlets.  Such  lakes  show  th-at  the  drainage  of  the  region  in 
which  they  are  has  not  yet  become  established.  Since  the  great  ice- 
flood  filled  the  former  channels  and  left  the  landscape  without  definite 
stream  courses,  the  development  of  land  drainage,  as  described  in  Chap- 
ter One,  has  not  yet  had  time  to  become  worked  out.  One  has  but 
to  glance  at  any  map  of  the  State  which  shows  the  rivers  and  lakes  to 
see  the  marked  contrast  between  that  part  of  our  State  which  lies  west 
of  the  Missouri  River,  where  the  land  was  not  covered  by  the  ice-flood, 
and  that  part  of  the  State  which  was  covered  by  the  ice.  The  net- 
work of  rivers  and  small  streams  and  the  absence  of  lakes  west  of  the 
Missouri  River,  and  the  absence  of  rivers  or  even  small  streams  and 
the  great  number  of  small  lakes,  over  a  vast  region  east  of  the  river, 
strike  the  eye  at  once  and  hold  the  attention  of  the  thoughtful  reader. 
The  rounded  hills  which  are  so  marked  a  feature  east  of  the  Missouri 
River  to  the  Valley  of  the  Red  River  of  the  North,  between  and  among 
which  hills  are  the  round,  oval,  and  irregular  hollows  often  filled  with 
water  forming  the  lakes  just  mentioned,  are  morainic  hills,  which  have 
been  described  before,  and  the  lakes  are  morainic  lakes. 

The  Old  (Pre-Grlacial)  Landscape  of  North  Dakota. — What  was  the  land 
surface  of  North  Dakota  before  the  Glacial  Period?  What  was  then 
the  land  surface  is  not  now,  except  that  part  of  the  State  which  lies  west 
of  the  Missouri  River.  The  old  landscape,  or  what  we  may  call  Old 
North  Dakota,  is  buried  beneath  the  drift,  covered  by  a  mantle  of  clay, 


NORTH  DAKOTA,  THE  OLD  AND  THE  NEW.  77 

boulders,  sand,  and  gravel  from  four  or  five  feet  to  300  feet  in  thickness. 
It  will  be  of  interest  to  inquire  what  was  the  appearance  of  the  land- 
scape before  this  great  change  took  place, — before  the  hills  were  planed 
down  and  the  valleys  filled,  by  the  great  ice-plow. 

The  Cretaceous  Inland  Sea. — In  order  to  understand  what  the  old 
landscape  of  North  Dakota  was,  it  is  necessary  to  ga  far  back  in  the 
story  of  the  past  to  the  time  when  nearly  or  quite  all  of  what  is  now 
North  Dakota  was  under  the  sea,  and  the  rocks  which  now  form  the 
bed-rock  under  the  drift  were  being  deposited  as  mud  on  the  sea 
bottom. 

At  this  time  the  Gulf  of  Mexico  extended  up  the  Mississippi  Val- 
ley to  the  mouth  of  the  Ohio  River,  and  a  great  arm  from  the  western 
part  of  the  Gulf  of  Mexico  formed  an  inland  sea  extending  north  over 
what  is  now  western  Texas,  and  Indian  Territory,  and  covering  Kan- 
sas, Nebraska,  South  and  North  Dakota,  thence  extending  far  into 
British  America.  (See  Fig.  75,  p.  174.)  The  sediments  washed  into 
this  sea  from  the  land  were  spread  over  its  bottom  as  mud.  These  be- 
came the  layers  of  shale  and  sandstone  now  the  bed-rock  of  the  North 
Dakota  landscape.  This  period  of  Geologic  Time  is  known  as  the 
Cretaceous  Era.  All  the  strata  or  layers  of  shale  and  sandstone  which 
come  to  the  surface  in  our  State,  or  which  are  pierced  by  borings  for 
wells,  belong  to  the  Cretaceous  series  of  rocks.  All  the  sediments  of 
which  they  are  composed  were  deposited  upon  the  bottom  of  the  great 
Inland  Sea  during  the  Cretaceous  Era.  This  great  Cretaceous  sea 
bottom  therefore  became  the  original  landscape  of  what  is  now  North 
Dakota. 

Underneath  the  mantle  of  drift  are  the  layers  of  rock  which  were 
once  the  mud  of  this  sea  bottom.  Where  the  streams  have  cut  down 
through  the  overlying  drift  these  rocks  are  exposed  to  view,  and  in  the 
Bad  Lands  where  there  is  no  drift,  the  upper  layers  of  these  rocks  are 
well  exposed  in  the  steep  sides  of  the  buttes,  for  the  layers  of  rock,  cut 
into  by  the  streams,  form  the  buttes  for  which  this  part  of  the  State  is 
noted. 

Pre-Glacial  Erosion. — The  flat  tops  of  the  buttes  and  table-lands  were 
once  part  of  the  great  plain  which  was  lifted  above  the  sea  to  form  the 
land  of  North  Dakota.  Erosion,  or  the  cutting  of  valleys  by  streams, 
has  been  going  on  in  this  western  region  since  the  time  before  the 
Glacial  Period.  The  rocks  which  are  at  the  surface  in  the  western 
part  of  the  State  may  therefore  be  imagined  to  extend  eastward  under- 


78  THE    STORY   OF   THE    PRAIRIES. 

neath  the  drift  materials.  The  edges  of  these  layers  outcrop  or  come 
to  the  surface  along  the  eastern  front  of  the  Coteau  du  Missouri.  The 
edges  of  the  layers  outcrop  because  the  layers  which  once  extended 
farther  east  have  been  carried  away  by  erosion. 

The  Coteau  du  Missouri  and  the  Turtle  Mountains  are  regions 
which  were  higher  before  the  Glacial  Period  than  the  country  east  of 
them.  The  region  embraced  in  the  great  central  portion  of  the  State 
was  a  broad  lowland  plain.  Streams  had  formed  valleys ;  the  old  ocean 
bottom,  which  had  been  elevated  and  become  dry  land,  had  become 
cut  up  by  valleys.  The  hills  were  slowly  being  carried  away  by  rains 
and  rivers.  This  process  had  gone  on  till  nearly  the  whole  land  surface 
of  the  central  part  of  the  State  had  been  worn  down  to  a  new  level. 

The  Missouri  River  and  its  tributaries  from  the  west,  the  Little 
Missouri,  the  Heart,  and  the  Cannon  Ball,  in  North  Dakota,  and  the 
Grand,  Moreau,  and  Cheyenne,  in  South  Dakota,  probably  once  dis- 
charged their  waters  to  the  east  and  north  by  the  course  of  the  pres- 
ent Red  River  of  the  North.  This  great  northward-flowing  river  had 
made  a  wide  valley  in  eastern  North  Dakota  and  western  Minnesota. 
The  present  Red  River  of  the  North  now  occupies  this  valley,  but  of 
course  the  Red  River  Valley  is  now  on  top  of  the  great  mantle  of  drift 
which  fills  the  old  valley.  Pembina  Mountain  and  the  highland  south 
to  the  Coteau  des  Prairies  form  the  western  boundary  of  this  valley. 
Pembina  Mountain  rises  350  to  450  feet  from  the  lower  land  to  the 
east.  Sixty  miles  farther  south,  the  Great  Northern  Railway  rises 
more  than  300  feet  in  passing  on  to  this  highland  from  Larimore  to 
Petersburg. 


CHAPTER  THE  EIGHTH. 
GLACIAL  LAKE  AGASSIZ. 

The  Conditions — It  has  already  been  observed  that  there  was  a  wide 
and  deep  valley  occupying-  the  present  Red  River  Valley  before  the 
Glacial  Period.  The  western  side  of  this  valley  was  the  Manitoba  Es- 
carpment, the  continuation  of  Pembina  Mountain  southward  to  the 
Coteau  des  Prairies.  The  eastern  side  of  the  valley  was  the  higher 
land  of  northwestern  Minnesota,  the  "Great  Divide"  or  continental 
watershed,  called  in  our  geographies  the  "Height  of  Land,"  from  which 
streams  flow  south  by  the  way  of  the  Mississippi  River  to  the  Gulf  of 
Mexico,  east  by  Lake  Superior  to  the  Gulf  of  St.  Lawrence,  and  north 
by  the  Red  River  of  the  North  to  Hudson's  Bay. 

The  head  of  this  great  valley  was  south  of  Wahpeton  in  the  region 
between  the  Coteau  des  Prairies  west  of  Lake  Traverse  and  the  Height 
of  Land  on  the  east. 

The  map,  Figure  9,  shows  the  portion  of  North  America  which  was 
covered  by  the  Great  Ice-Sheet,  and  the  position  of  the  State  of  North 
Dakota.  You  see  that  all  of  the  State  except  the  southwest  corner 
•was  covered  by  the  ice.  The  great  valley  of  the  Red  River  of  the 
North  was  filled  with  ice;  the  Coteau  des  Prairies  and  Pembina  Moun- 
tain, and  the  Turtle  Mountain  Plateau,  were  covered,  and  the  great, 
interior  region  occupied  by  the  valleys  of  the  Sheyenne,  James,  and 
Mouse  Rivers  was  filled;  and  the  eastern  edge  of  the  great  western 
plateau,  the  Coteau  clu  Missouri,  was  also  buried  beneath  the  vast  sheet 
of  ice. 

Imagine  yourself  standing  upon  the  surface  of  this  great  sheet  of 
ice  and  looking  away  over  its  broad  expanse.  Everywhere  is  snow 
and  ice,  the  surface  of  a  great  snow  sea,  no  land  anywhere  in  sight, 
nothing  but  saow  and  ice.  Deep,  very  deep,  all  over  the  land  lay  the 
great  sheet.  How  deep  was  the  ice?  Let  us  see.  How  high  are  the 
highest  grain  elevators  you  have  seen?  Less  than  100  feet  perhaps. 
Suppose  that  ten  elevators  were  placed  one  above  another,  even  then 
the  height  of  all  these  would  not  reach  up  one-half  as  high  as  the  sur- 

6  79 


80  THE   STORY   OF  THE   PRAIRIES. 

face  of  the  ice  was  here  in  North  Dakota,  probably.  And  if  this  height 
were  multiplied  by  ten  even  this  great  amount  would  be  much  less  than 
the  depth  of  the  ice  in  some  parts  of  North  America.  Remembering 
what  has  been  said  about  the  effect  upon  the  lower  parts  of  the  ice  of 
the  pressure  from  the  weight  of  the  mass,  think  of  the  force  which  this 
tremendous  mass  of  hard  ice,  moving  slowly  from  its  own  weight, 
exerted  upon  the  rocks  and  hills  which  it  came  against.  Think  what  it 
means  for  ice  to  flow,  pushing  its  way  into  the  valleys  and  filling  them, 
and  riding  over  the  hills  and  grinding  off  their  sides.  You  can  picture 
to  your  mind  something  about  how  so  much  "drift  material,"  fragments 
of  rock  and  earth,  were  broken  loose  and  scraped  from  the  surface  of 
the  ground  underneath,  and  shoved  and  carried  along  by  the  mov- 
ing ice. 

You  can  now  understand  how  it  comes  that  there  is  the  great  depth 
of  clay,  gravel,  sand,  and  boulders  all  over  the  bottom  of  the  Red 
River  Valley,  for  these  are  the  broken  and  ground  up  rocks  which  were 
carried  by  the  ice,  and  when  the  ice  melted  these  materials  were  left.  In 
some  parts  of  the  Red  River  Valley  these  drift  materials  are  as  much 
as  300  feet  in  thickness. 

Of  course  there  was  no  river  where  is  now  the  Red  River  of  the 
North  when  the  ice-sheet  covered  this  region,  because  the  whole  valley 
was  filled  with  ice.  But  there  were  rivers  flowing  away  from  the  ice- 
sheet  toward  the  south,  for  the  melting  of  the  ice  caused  great  quan- 
tities of  water,  and  these  flood  waters  had  to  escape  somewhere,  and  the 
only  escape  was  toward  the  south  into  the  Mississippi  River.  Many 
streams  which  flowed  away  from  the  great  ice  mass  as  large  rivers  have 
ceased  to  be,  and  their  names  are  not  in  our  geographies.  There  is 
no  melting  ice-sheet  to  furnish  the  water  to  keep  them  running.  Their 
old  valleys  are  still  left,  often  wide  and  deep  channels.  In  some  of 
these  old  channels  much  smaller  streams  still  run,  supplied  with  water 
by  the  rains  which  fall  upon  the  land. 

One  of  these  large  river  channels  is  that  in  w7hich  Lakes  Traverse 
and  Big  Stone,  on  the  boundary  between  South  Dakota  and  Minne- 
sota, now  lie,  and  along  the  old  bottom  of  which  the  Minnesota  River 
now  flows  to  its  big  bend  at  Mankato.  This  old  river  channel  is  of 
much  interest  to  us  because  it  was  for  a  long  time,  as  we  shall  see  pres- 
ently, the  outlet  of  Lake  Agassiz.  The  great  river  which  cut  this  wide 
and  deep  channel  has  been  given  a  name,  although  that  name  does 
not  appear  in  our  geographies.  It  has  been  called  the  River  Warren, 


GLACIAL   LAKE   AGASSIZ.  81 

in  honor  of  General  G.  K.  Warren  of  the  United  States  Army,  who 
in  1868  discovered  the  old  channel  and  explained  its  origin. 

The  Beginnings  of  the  Lake — If  now  it  is  recalled  that  the  land  about 
Lakes  Traverse  and  Big  Stone  is  higher  than  the  land  to  the  north  (and 
this  must  be  so  since  the  Red  River  flows  toward  the  north),  and  that 
the  Coteau  cles  Prairies  near  the  southeast  corner  of  the  State  and  the 
line  of  highland  from  these  north  to  Pembina  Mountain  are  higher  than 
the  lands  to  the  east,  and  the  Height  of  Land  in  Minnesota  is  higher 
than  the  Valley  lands  to  the  west,  it  will  be  easy  to  understand  how  the 
glacial  Lake  Agassiz  came  into  existence.  For,  when  the  ice  had 
melted  back  so  that  the  regions  about  Wahpeton  and  Fargo  were  no 
longer  covered  by  the  ice-sheet,  but  the  ice  front  was  still  as  far  south 
as  Hillsboro  and  Blanchard,  the  water  from  the  melting  ice  filled  this 
basin.  From  the  melting  of  the  ice  the  basin  began  to  overflow,  and 
the  outlet  naturally  was  formed  at  the  lowest  point  of  the  rim.  This 
outlet  was  by  the  old  channel  in  which,  as  has  been  stated,  Lakes  Traverse 
and  Big  Stone  now  lie,  and  which  was  the  former  channel  of  the  Shey- 
enne  River  before  Lake  Agassiz  began  to  be. 

If  we  think  of  the  great  ice-sheet  retreating  toward  the  north,  that 
is,  that  it  melted  at  its  southern  edge  more  rapidly  than  the  mass  moved 
southward,  it  will  not  be  difficult  to  understand  how  it  was  that  this 
lake  became  larger,  until  finally  it  spread  over  a  great  area,  the  extent 
of  which  in  North  Dakota,  Minnesota,  and  Canada  has  been  determined 
by  Mr.  Warren  Upham  to  have  been  as  much  as  110,000  square  miles. 
On  the  map,  Figure  9,  you  will  see  that  Lakes  Winnipeg-,  Manitoba, 
and  Winnipegosis  still  occupy  a  part  of  the  old  lake  bottom.  These  are 
remnants  of  Lake  Agassiz  which  still  remain  to  tell  of  the  glory  which 
has  been. 

After  the  ice  had  melted  back  from  the  position  it  occupied  when 
the  Dovre  Moraine  was  formed,  the  Sheyenne  River  discharged  its 
waters  by  way  of  the  River  Warren  and  the  present  large  channel  of 
the  Minnesota  River  into  the  Mississippi  and  so  to  the  Gulf  of  Mexico. 
But  when  the  ice  had  melted  farther  back  and  a  lake  began  to  be 
formed,  then  the  Sheyenne  discharged  its  waters  into  the  lake.  The 
Sheyenne  was  a  much  larger  stream  than  it  is  now  because  the  waters 
from  the  melting  ice  kept  it  at  flood,  and  it  carried  a  large  amount  of 
sand  cut  from  its  channel  and  silt  from  the  melting  ice.  These  at  first 
helped  to  build  up  the  flood-plain  of  the  River  Warren,  but  when  the 
ice  had  melted  farther  back  so  that  the  river  spread  out  into  a  long 


82  THE   STORY   OF  THE   PRAIRIES. 

narrow  lake,  a  delta  began  to  be  built  up  at  the  mouth  of  the  Sheyenne. 
The  great  Sheyenne  Delta  thus  began  to  be  formed  as  soon  as  Lake 
Agassiz  began  to  exist. 

When  the  ice  had  melted  back  farther  and  Lake  Agassiz  had  be- 
come larger,  the  delta  first  formed  served  to  block  the  course  of  the 
river  and  turned  its  waters  to  the  east,  so  that  the  Sheyenne  then  dis- 
charged its  waters  toward  the  east  into  Lake  Agassiz,  and  continued 
to  build  up  the  delta  into  a  broad  sand-plain.  The  waters  of  Lake 
Agassiz  overflowed  south  by  the  River  Warren. 

We  see  therefore  that  at  first  Lake  Agassiz  was  a  long  narrow  sheet 
of  water  about  thirty  miles  in  length  and  only  one,  two,  or  three  miles 
in  width,  extending  in  a  northwest  and  southeast  direction  from  the 
Big  Bend  of  the  Sheyenne  east  of  Lisbon  away  toward  Hankinson. 
The  higher  land  west  formed  the  shore  on  that  side,  and  the  wall  of  the 
glacier  formed  its  eastern  shore.  Lake  Agassiz  was  therefore  at  first 
little  more  than  a  broadening  of  the  Sheyenne  River. 

On  the  western  shore  of  this  first  beginning  of  Lake  Agassiz  was 
formed  the  Milnor  Beach  or  shore-line  for  a  distance  of  about  ten  miles. 
This  beach  is  about  twenty-five  feet  higher  than  the  highest  beach 
formed  after  the  lake  became  a  larger  sheet  of  water.  The  waters  of 
the  long  narrow  lake,  finding  outlet  by  the  channel  of  the  River  War- 
ren, cut  down  this  channel  about  twenty-five  feet.  It  was  at  this  lower 
level  that  Lake  Agassiz  stood  during  the  time  when  the  highest  Herman 
Beach  was  formed,  called  the  Herman  Stage  of  the  lake. 

Increase  in  Size  and  Depth. — The  lake  soon  became  much  larger  with 
the  retreat  of  the  ice  toward  the  north.  A  large  and  conspicuous  mo- 
raine, the  Fergus  Falls  Moraine,  marks  the  next  halting  place  of  the 
edge  of  the  glacier.  Lake  Agassiz  at  this  time  was  a  sheet  of  water 
covering  an  area  of  about  5,000  square  miles.  It  extended  from  the 
outlet  at  Lake  Traverse  to  the  wall  of  the  ice  front  as  far  north  as  Ada, 
Minnesota,  and  Caledonia,  Hillsboro,  and  Blanchard,  North  Dakota. 
Its  eastern  shore  in  Minnesota  was  about  eight  miles  west  of  the  City 
of  Fergus  Falls  and  three  miles  east  of  Barnesville.  Its  western  shore 
in  North  Dakota  was  near  Wyndmere,  at  Sheldon,  and  about  five 
miles  east  of  Buffalo.  Its  depth  at  Breckenridge  and  Wahpeton  was 
about  100  feet,  at  Fargo  and  Moorhead  about  200  feet,  and  about  275 
feet  at  Caledonia.  It  was  while  the  lake  occupied  this  area  that  the 
highest  shore-line,  known  as  the  Herman  Beach,  was  formed  about 
this  part  of  the  lake. 


GLACIAL   LAKE  AGASSIZ.  83 

The  Fergus  Falls  Moraine  is  easily  recognized  on  the  east  side  of 
the  lake  bottom  in  Minnesota  by  its  high,  rounded  and  irregular  hills 
and  hollows.  It  appears  again  on  the  west  side  of  Lake  Agassiz  in 
North  Dakota  as  rolling  hills  or  very  uneven  prairies  near  Galesburg, 
and  becomes  more  rugged  and  like  the  usual  type  of  morainic  hills 
east  of  Erie.  Upon  the  area  of  the  Red  River  Valley,  however,  the 
materials  which  were  dumped  at  the  edge  of  the  melting  ice-sheet 
where  the  ice  front  was  bathed  by  the  waters  of  the  lake  were  washed 
away  and  leveled  down  by  the  action  of  the  waves  and  currents  of  the 
lake  and  distributed  over  the  bottom. 

The  course  of  the  moraine  across  the  bottom  of  Lake  Agassiz  is 
marked  by  the  slightly  undulating  character  of  the  prairie.  The  mo- 
rainic materials  were  not  entirely  leveled  by  the  action  of  the  lake  wa- 
ters so  that  the  bottom  became  slightly  uneven.  This  belt  of  slightly 
uneven  prairie  extends  across  the  Red  River  Valley  from  Ada  and 
Rolette  in  Minnesota  in  a  westriiortrwesterly  direction  to  Caledonia, 
Reynolds,  Buxton,  and  Cummings,  North  Dakota,  and  thence  south- 
westerly to  Blanchard,  varying  in  width  from  three  to  six  or  seven 
miles. 

The  undulations  in  the  prairie  surface  upon  the  belt  of  this  leveled 
moraine  vary  from  three  to  five  feet,  though  sometimes  eight  or  ten 
feet,  above  the  adjacent  hollows.  Over  this  belt  many  boulders  are 
scattered  and  gravel  is  more  common  than  elsewhere  upon  the  lake 
bottom.  They  sometimes  occur  in  chains  or  long  patches  upon  the 
beach  ridges,  having  been  carried  or  shoved  up  onto  the  shore  by  the 
lake  ice  during  the  winters,  as  suggested  in  the  chapter  on  Shore  Boul- 
der Chains.  (Chapter  Six.)  Such  a  boulder  chain  extends  for  several 
miles  along  the  crest  of  the  Blanchard  Beach  between  Hillsboro  and 
Mayville. 

Where  the  Fergus  Falls  and  Leaf  Hills  Moraines  are  crossed  by 
the  Red  River  between  Caledonia  and  Belmont,  occurs  what  are  called 
the  Goose  Rapids.  The  rapids  are  caused  by  the  dam  made  across  the 
river's  course  by  the  materials  of  the  moraines.  Boulders  are  so  numerous 
along  the  river  channel  here  that  boats  cannot  pass  in  time  of  low  water. 

The  next  increase  in  the  size  of  Lake  Agassiz  was  caused  by  the 
recession  or  melting  back  of  the  ice-sheet  to  the  position  of  the  Leaf 
Hills  Moraine. 

.  The  Leaf  Hills  Moraine  of  the  Minnesota  Glacier  is  marked  upon 
the  area  of  Lake  Agassiz  by  slight  undulations  in  the  prairie  surface, 


84  THE   STORY   OF  THE   PRAIRIES, 

as  in  the  case  of  the  Fergus  Falls  Moraine.  The  two  moraines  run 
together  where  they  cross  the  Red  River  so  they  cannot  be  separated 
from  each  other.  From  near  the  Red  River  the  Leaf  Hills  Moraine 
extends  northeast  nearly  to  Red  Lake  in  Minnesota,  and  northwest 
along  the  east  side  of  the  Elk  Valley  Delta  east  of  Larimore,  and  con- 
tinues as  "The  Ridge"  and  farther  north  as  "The  Mountains"  on  the 
east  side  of  Elk  and  Golden  Valleys  to  Edinburg.  The  area  of  Lake 
Agassiz  will  therefore  be  seen  to  have  been  increased  by  two  triangu- 
lar areas,  the  larger  of  which  embraces  the  region  about  Mayville  and 
Portland  and  north  to  Arvilla  and  McCanna,  the  other  being  north  and 
east  of  Caledonia,  in  Minnesota. 

The  positions  of  the  Dakota  and  Minnesota  Glaciers  or  Lobes  of 
the  Great  Ice-Sheet  at  the  time  of  the  formation  of  the  Leaf  Hills  Mo- 
raine are  shown  in  Figure  20.  It  will  be  seen  that  it  was  the  Minnesota 
Glacier  which  covered  the  northern  part  of  the  Red  River  Valley  and 
formed  the  moraine  just  described. 

The  next  increase  in  the  size  of  Lake  Agassiz  is  very  marked.  It 
would  seem  as  though  the  climate  must  have  become  warmer  from 
some  cause,  for  the  edge  of  the  ice-sheet  moved  back  or  receded  towards 
the  north  near  to  where  the  City  of  Winnipeg  now  stands.  Thus  all 
that  part  of  North  Dakota  which  was  covered  by  Lake  Agassiz  was 
now  relieved  of  its  burden  of  ice  and  was  covered  by  the  waters  of  the 
lake.  The  Dakota  Glacier  had  not  yet  melted  entirely  from  off  North 
Dakota,  The  moraines  which  are  crossed  by  the  Great  Northern  Rail- 
way between  Lakota  and  Devils  Lake  and  those  extending  across  the 
northeast  corner  of  the  State  between  Pembina  Mountain  and  Devils 
Lake  and  west  to  the  Turtle  Mountains  were  formed  at  later  stages 
than  the  Leaf  Hills  Moraine,  and  after  Lake  Agassiz  had  spread  over 
the  whole  Red  River  Valley  in  North  Dakota  and  Minnesota  from  Lake 
Traverse  to  near  the  City  of  Winnipeg.  These  moraines,  formed  dur- 
ing the  successive  stages  of  the  Dakota  Glacier  while  it  covered  this 
part  of  the  State,  belong  to  the  Itasca  Stage  of  the  Dakota  Glacier. 
The  Minnesota  Glacier  extended  as  far  south  as  Lake  Itasca  in  Minne- 
sota, and  formed  the  hills  which  hem  in  the  waters  of  that  and  other 
small  lakes  in  Minnesota. 

Still  another  period  occurred  when  the  forward  movement  of  the 
ice-sheet  was  not  so  rapid  as  the  melting,  and  Lake  Agassiz  extended 
still  farther  northward  to  the  southern  ends  of  Lakes  Winnipeg  and 
Manitoba,  and  eastward  nearly  to  the  Lake  of  the  Woods,  and  west- 


GLACIAL   LAKE  AGASSIZ.  85 

ward  to  a  line  running  nearly  south  from  Lake  Manitoba  to  Pembina 
Mountain.  The  hills  forming  the  moraine  which  marked  the  position 
of  the  ice  at  this  stage  of  the  development  of  Lake  Agassiz  are  known 
as  the  Mesabi  Moraine. 

Finally  another  recession  of  the  ice,  due  probably  to  increase.d 
warmth  of  the  climate,  caused  the  areas  now  occupied  by  Lakes  Win- 
nipeg and  Manitoba  to  be  uncovered,  a  moraine  being  formed  along 
what  is  now  the  eastern  shore  of  Lake  Winnipeg.  This  moraine  forms 
a  dam  which  still  prevents  the  drawing  off  of  the  waters  of  this  lake. 
Some  of  these  morainic  hills  which  are  partly  covered  by  the  waters  of 
this  lake  now  form  islands  along  its  eastern  side. 

Along  the  great  ice  wall  which  formed  the  northern  shore  of  Lake 
Agassiz  the  waters  were  probably  the  deepest  that  they  were  any- 
where in  the  entire  lake.  The  slope  of  the  Red  River  Valley,  which 
is  the  old  lake  bottom,  descends  from  Lake  Traverse  towards  the  north 
to  the  Nelson  River  outlet  of  Lake  Winnipeg,  a  distance  in  a  straight 
line  of  about  700  miles.  It  will  be  recalled  that  when  the  northern 
ice-shore  of  Lake  Agassiz  was  at  Caledonia  the  water  was  there  about 
275  feet  deep,  200  feet  at  Fargo,  and  about  100  feet  at  Breckenridge 
and  Wahpeton,  and  flowed  over  the  rim  of  the  basin  at  Lake  Traverse. 
When  the  lake  had  extended  as  far  north  as  the  present  mouth  of  the 
Red  River  at  Lake  Winnipeg  its  depth  was  650  feet;  over  the  northern 
end  of  Lake  Manitoba  about  525  feet;  and  when  the  morainic  hills 
which  hem  in  the  waters  of  Lake  Winnipeg  on  the  east  were  clumped 
from  the  melting  ice  they  were  left  in  water  from  600  to  700  feet  deep. 

The  great  depth  of  the  water  of  Lake  Agassiz  at  the  ice  front  on 
this  far  north  shore,  and  the  great  amount  of  material  deposited  as  a 
moraine  may  help  to  explain  why  Lake  Winnipeg  has  not  disappeared 
along  with  the  rest  of  Lake  Agassiz.  Deep  bodies  of  water  are  less 
readily  affected  by  storms  and  their  waves  are  less  active  in  eroding 
the  bottom  and  shores:  The  moraine  which  was  deposited  at  the  edge 
of  the  ice  therefore  remained  as- hills  below  the  surface  of  the  water, 
and  they  were  not  leveled  clown  when  the  waters  of  the  lake  were 
finally  lowered  by  the  melting  of  the  ice  farther  north.  This  range 
of  morainic  hills  therefore  remains  as  a  clam  holding  back  the  waters 
of  Lake  Winnipeg  and  the  sister  lakes,  Manitoba  and  Winnipegosis, 
this  group  of  lakes  being  the  last  vestige  of  the  great  Lake  Agassiz. 

During  all  the  time  in  which  Lake  Agassiz  was  extending  its  area 
the  waters  were  unable  to  flow  to  the  north  by  the  present  Nelson 


86  THE   STORY   OF  THE   PRAIRIES. 

River  outlet  to  Hudson's  Bay  because  of  the  Great  Ice-Sheet  which 
barred  the  way.  This  still  lay  upon  the  land  between  the  present  Lake 
Winnipeg  and  Hudson's  Bay  and  probably  still  filled  the  basin  of  Hud- 
son's Bay.  The  waters  therefore  discharged  by  some  northeast- 
ern outlet  into  Lake  Superior.  The  length  of  Lake  Agassiz  from 
south  to  north  was  now  about  550  miles,  and  its  width  irom  Red  Lake 
in  Minnesota  to  Larimore  in  North  Dakota  was  about  130  miles.  Its 
area  embraced  about  65,000  square  miles  in  Canada,  about  15,000 
square  miles  in  Minnesota,  and  about  6,500  square  miles  in  North 
Dakota. 

Into  this  vast  sheet  of  water  many  large  rivers  poured  their  waters, 
and  to  these  were  added  the  waters  from  the  melting  ice-sheet  which 
poured  directly  into  the  lake. 

The  melting  along  the  edge  of  the  ice-sheet,  which  was  the  north 
shore  of  the  lake,  as  we  have  seen  caused  the  dumping  of  a  great 
amount  of  rock, — boulders,  gravel,  sand,  and  fine  silt,  into  the  lake, 
much  of  which  was  washed  away  and  spread  over  the  bottom  of  the 
lake.  The  rivers  also  brought  in  gravel,  sand,  and  fine  silt  in  great 
quantity  which  also  was  added  to  the  floor  materials  of  the  bot- 
tom. Some  of  these  streams  formed  deltas  at  their  mouths.  All  did 
not  form  deltas,  for  there  was  much  more  gravel,  sand,  and  silt  from 
the  melting  ice-sheet  delivered  to  some  of  these  streams  than  to  oth- 
ers. Those  which  carried  the  greatest  loads  of  earth  materials,  when 
they  reached  the  lake  shore  and  their  currents  were  slackened,  dropped 
their  burdens  and  so  formed  deltas. 

There  were  three  large  deltas  formed  on  the  west  side  of  Lake 
Agassiz  in  North  Dakota,  and  one  in  Manitoba.  Two  smaller  ones 
were  formed  on  the  east  side  in  Minnesota.  Those  in  North  Dakota 
were  formed  by  the  Sheyenne,  Elk,  and  Pembina  Rivers,  and  the  one 
in  Manitoba  by  the  Assiniboine  River.  The  two  in  Minnesota  were 
formed  by  the  Buffalo  and  Sand  Hill  Rivers.  These  deltas  all  bear  the 
names  of  the  streams  by  which  they  were  formed.  There  is  no  Elk 
River  now,  for  this  was  a  glacial  river  only,  that  is,  its  waters  came  en- 
tirely from  the  melting  ice,  and  when  the  ice  had  all  melted  it  ceased 
to  be.  However,  its  old  valley  is  left,  and  the  delta  it  built,  as  we  shall 
see  later. 

The  lands  of  the  Valley  of  the  Red  River  of  the  North  are  the  most 
fertile  and  the  most  nearly  level  probably  in  the  world.  They  are  the 
most  fertile  because  the  fine  sediments  of  ground  up  limestone  and 


GLACIAL   LAKE  AGASSIZ. 


87 


88  THE   STORY   OF  THE  PRAIRIES. 

other  rocks  which  were  deposited  upon  the  bottom  of  Lake  Agassiz 
make  a  most  productive  soil,  and  this  is  rendered  still  more  fertile  by 
the  black  organic  matter  which  gathered  while  the  waters  were  drying 
off  from  the  old  bottom.  It  is  the  most  nearly  level  large  tract  of 
land  in  the  world  probably,  because  of  the  leveling  action  of  the  waters 
of  the  vast  lake  Which  covered  it. 

The  Red  River  Valley.  —  While  the  old  lake  bottom  is  nearly  level, 
there  are  some  uneven  parts  which  are  of  much  interest.  Ridges  of 
sand  and  gravel  extend  for  great  distances  along  the  level  prairie  on 
the  east  and  west  sides  of  the  Valley.  These  are  beach  ridges  or  off- 
shore sand-bars  piled  up  by  the  waves  of  the  lake.  But  the  shore  did  not 
remain  always  at  the  "same  place,  and  a  margin  or  belt  of  land  was  left 
along  the  edge  which  was  not  covered  by  the  water.  What  had  been 
lake  bottom  became  land.  Where  the  waves  had  once  beaten  upon  the 
shore  and  left  long  ridges  of  sand  and  gravel  the  waters  ceased  to 
reach.  The  level  of  the  lake  had  become  lower,  and  the  shore  line  had 
moved  in  toward  the  center  or  axis  of  the  lake.  The  waves  therefore 
beat  upon  the  shore  at  a  lower  level,  and  a  beach  ridge  was  built  by 
the  waves,  marking  the  new  shore  line.  The  successive  levels  or 
stages  of  the  lake  are  marked  by  these  shore  lines  or  beach  ridges,  so 
that  the  old  bottom  of  the  lake  as  we  now  see  it  is  not  quite  level. 

Each  of  these  ridges  is  a  little  higher  from  the  center  or  axis  of  the 
lake  toward  the  shore. 

Lakes  often  build  up  off-shore  sand-bars  because,  when  the  waves 
roll  in  toward  shore  carrying  and  rolling  over  the  bottom  sand,  earth, 
and  gravel,  these  materials  are  dropped  where  the  waves  "break"  upon 
the  bottom.  Along  the  off-shore  line  where  the  ^breakers"  are  formed 


BEACH 

_  ^  :^^  T/LL,  SLIGHTLY  FffOD£D. 

FIG.  41.    Typical  Section  Across  a  Beach  Ridge  of  Lake  Agassiz.     Scale,  100  feet  to  an  inch. 

U.  S.  Geological  Survey. 

the  water  loses  a  good  deal  of  its  force,  the  sand  and  gravel  which  were 
being  carried  are  mostly  thrown  down,  and  a.  "bar"  is  thus  built  up. 
To  this  off-shore  bar  layer  after  layer  is  added  till  it  is  built  up  as  high 
as  the  surface  of  the  water,  or  even  higher,  for  when  the  waves  roll  high 
during  storms,  ridges  of  sand  and  gravel  are  piled  up  higher  than  the 
surface  of  the  water,  sometimes  fifteen  to  twenty  feet.  In  these  ridges 


GLACIAL   LAKE  AGASSIZ.  o9 

gravel-  and  sand-pits  are  often  opened,  and  the  sand  and  gravel  are 
often  beautifully  arranged  and  assorted  in  layers. 

It  is  commonly  the  case  that  the  land  is  not  as  high  back  of,  or  on 
the  shore  side,  of  these  ridges.  Here,  when  the  waters  were  beating 
upon  the  shores  and  the  waves  were  driven  over  the  sand  and  gravel  of 
the  off-shore  bars,  was  a  lagoon,  a  place  where  the  water  which  was 
driven  over  the  ridge  formed  a  shallow  pool.  Sueh  places  are  often 
seen  on  the  prairies  of  the  Red  River  Valley,  and  the  soil  in  such  low 
places  is  generally  more  "heavy"  or  clayey,  and  not  infrequently 
marshy,  while  the  crest  of  the  ridge  is  sanely  or  gravelly  only  a  few 
rods  distant.  This  is  because  the  coarser  material  carried  by  the  waves 
was  thrown  down  when  the  waves  "broke"  upon  the  bar,  and  only  the 
finer  sediment,  such  as  forms  the  "heavier"  clayey  soil,  was  carried  over 
the  ridge  and  deposited  in  the  lagoon. 


FIG.  42.    Profile  Across  Beaches  at  and  near  Wheatland.     Horizontal  scale,  3  miles  to  an  inch. 

U.  5.  Geological  Survey. 

A  cross  section  from  the  Red  River  to  the  outer  and  highest  shore 
therefore  shows  a  rise  by  steps  from  the  lo\Ver  land  along  the  river  to 
the  highest  shore  line.  Such  a  cross  section  from  Casselton  west  to 


^J^--  ° '?*.:' •'^••i'. •••;•  ••~-C>i'9~*--:'-i'.-?-~:.'~'-^Z 


500 


FIG.  43.     Section  Across  the  Red  River  Valley  on  the  Latitude  of  Breckenridge  and  Wahpeton. 
Horizontal  scale,  25  miles  to  an  inch.      U.  S.  Geological  Survey. 


90 


THE   STORY   OF  THE   PRAIRIES. 


* — — - — — — * * ?——£ — *  *   »'  **    "     *  •"      *  L"      v      "    V     v   .  * '     *   J.^ 

FIG.  44.    Section  Across  the  Red  River  Valley  at  Fargo.    After  Upham. 


FIG.  45.    Section  Across  the  Red  River  Valley  at  Grand  Forks.-    After  Upham. 


FIG.  46.    Section  Across  the  Red  River  Valley  near  International  Boundary.    After  Upham. 

the  highest  Herman  Beach  is  shown  in  Figure  42.  A  section  across 
a  beach  ridge  is  shown  in  Figure  41.  The  ridge  is  made  up  of  sand  and 
gravel  arranged  in  layers.  Underneath  the  ridge  is  the  boulder-clay 
called  "till,"  the  unstratified  drift  which  underlies  the  materials  nearer 
the  surface  which  were  arranged  in  layers  by  the  waters  of  the  lake. 

Sections  across  the  Red  River  Valley  at  Wahpeton,  Fargo,  Grand 
Forks,  and  along  the  International  Boundary,  are  shown  in  Figures 
43,  44,  45,  46.  These  sections  show  the  till  or  boulder-clay  under- 
lying the  wave-washed  materials,  and  underneath  the  till  the  layers  of 
the  stratified  rocks,  the  top  of  which  was  the  land  surface,  the  pre- 
glacial  landscape,  before  the  great  ice-sheet  spread  over  the  land. 

The  upper  portion  of  the  clay  which  makes  up  the  deeper  sub-soil 
of  the  Red  River  Valley  is  arranged  in  layers,  as  is  shown  in  Figure  47. 
This  is  due  to  the  fact  that  the  upper  part  of  the  drift  clay  of  the  Red 


GLACIAL   LAKfc   AGASSIZ.  91 

River  Valley  was  deposited  in  the  water  and  spread  over  the  bottom 
of  Lake  Agassiz.  This  material  was  dropped  from  the  melting  ice 
while  the  ice-sheet  was  receding  and  the  lake  was  increasing  in  size, 
and  was  washed  by  the  waves  and  deposited  in  layers  upon  the  bottom. 


FIG.  47.    Stratified  Clay,  Sediments  of  Bottom  of  Lake  Agassiz.     Excavation  in  City  of  May vilie. 

Photograph  by  the  Author, 


CHAPTER  THE  NINTH. 

THE  DELTAS  AND  BEACHES  OF  LAKE  AGASSIZ. 

Three  deltas  were  formed  on  the  western  side  of  Lake  Agassiz  on 
that  part  of  the  bottom  now  embraced  in  North  Dakota.  These  are 
known  as  the  Sheyenne,  the  Elk  Valley,  and  the  Pembina  Deltas.  They 
were  formed  by  the  Sheyenne  River,  the  Glacial  Elk  River,  and  the 
Pembina  River.  These  rivers  were  flooded  by  the  waters  from  the  melt- 
ing ice-sheet,  and  when  their  swift  currents  entered  the  still  waters  of 
Lake  Agassiz  their  speed  was  checked  and  they  threw  down  the  burden 
of  materials  they  were  carrying,  the  coarse  gravel  and  sand  first,  and 
later  the  fine  sand  and  silt.  The  finer  sand  was  carried  for  many  miles 
into  the  lake  and  spread  out  as  a  great  fan,  and  the  finest  silt  was  spread 
over  all  the  bottom  of  the  lake,  being  distributed  by  the  waves  and 
currents. 

Not  all  the  streams  which  flowed  into  Lake  Agassiz  formed  deltas. 
It  is  interesting  to  inquire,  therefore,  why  the  Sheyenne  and  Pembina 
Rivers,  and  also  the  glacial  Elk  River,  which  ceased  to  be  a  river  at 
all  after  the  ice-sheet  had  melted  away,  should  have  formed  deltas^ 
while  other  streams  flowing  into  Lake  Agassiz  formed  no  deltas. 

We  have  seen  that  much  earth  material  was  carried  by  the  ice,  and 
that  much  water  flowed  away  from  the  edge  of  the  ice-sheet  from  the 
melting.  If  a  river  had  its  head  near  the  edge  of  the  ice-sheet,  or 
flowed  along  its  edge  so  as  to  receive  these  waters,  then  whatever 
gravel,  sand,  and  earth  the  ice  contained  might  be  in  considerable  part 
carried  to  the  river.  Some  parts  of  the  ice-sheet  probably  carried  more 
gravel  and  sand  than  other  parts,  depending  upon  the  kind  of  land 
surface  it  had  passed  over.  Then,  too,  the  edge  of  the  ice-sheet  was 
very  irregular  and  indented  by  jagged  places  made  by  the  melting,  and 
so  there  would  be  many  small  hollows  and  lakes  in  which  the  earth 
materials  from  the  ice  would  be  deposited,  so  that  not  all  the  streams 
which  flowed  at  flood  height  from  along  the  ice-sheet's  edge  received 
such  great  burdens  of  gravel  and  sand.  When,  therefore,  a  river  had 
its  head  near  a  portion  of  the  edge  of  the  ice-sheet  where  a  good  deal 

9-2 


THE  DELTAS  AND   BEACHES   OF   LAKE  AGASSIZ. 


93 


of  sand  was  left  so  that  it  was  washed  into  the  river's  channel  this 
stream,  having  a  swift  current  because  its  channel  was  kept  flooded, 
would  carry  much  sand  and  gravel  down  its  course. 


FIG.  48.    Profile  of  Elk  Valley  Delta  and  Beaches  at  Larimore  and  Arvilla.    After  Upham. 

Again  the  Elk  River  was  a  stream  which  at  first  probably  flowed  on 
the  surface  of  the  ice-sheet  in  the  hollow  between  the  Dakota  and 
Minnesota  Glaciers  (see  Figure  20),  though  it  later  formed  a  channel  in 
the  drift  between  these  Lobes,  and  this  river  formed  a  delta  thirty  to 
thirty-five  miles  long  and  from  five  to  twelve  miles  wide. 

In  Minnesota,  of  the  rivers  entering  Lake  Agassiz,  only  the  Buffalo 
and  Sand  Hill  Rivers  formed  deltas,  although  the  Red  River,  the  Wild 
Rice  River,  and  the  Red  Lake  River,  on  that  side  of  the  lake  were  as 
large  or  even  larger  than  these. 

The  Sheyenne  Delta. — When  the  ice-sheet  had  receded  so  that  its 
edge  rested  upon  the  high  hills  south  of  Devils  Lake,  the  Sheyenne 
River  received  a  great  influx  of  water  from  the  melting  ice,  and  with 
it  the  finer  materials  which  were  in  the  ice.  These  were  carried  by 
the  stream  down  its  course.  The  water  was  muddy,  something  as  the 
waters  of  our  streams  now  are  muddy  after  a  hard  rain,  or  when  they 
are  swollen  from  melting  snows.  Not  only  this,  but  sand  and  gravel 
which  were  too  coarse  to  be  carried  any  distance  by  the  current  would 
be  rolled  along  the  bottom,  or  taken  up  and  carried  for  a  short  distance 
and  thrown  down  again,  perhaps  forming  a  sand-bar,  to  be  in  turn  taken 
up  and  carried  on  again  by  the  varying  current.  So  at  the  mouth  of 
the  stream  where  the  current  met  the  still  waters  of  the  lake  these  were 
thrown  down,  first  the  coarser  gravel  and  then  the  finer  sand.  These 
became  the  delta. 

Little  by  little  the  river  kept  adding  more  materials  to  the  delta,  the 
coarser  being  dropped  nearer  the  shore  or  head  of  the  delta,  the  finer 
being  carried  farther  out,  and  the  finest,  which  would  remain  in  sus- 
pension in  the  water  for  a  long  time,  being  carried  far  out  and  dis- 
tributed over  the  lake  bottom  as  the  so-called  lacustrine  silt. 


94 


THE   STORY   OF   THE   PRAIRIES. 


The  delta  is  made  up  mostly  of  sand  and  gravel  arranged  in  layers. 
Whoever  has  traveled  along  the  lower  Sheyenne  River  south  and  east 
•of  the  Big  Bend  has  noticed  how  sandy  is  the  soil,  also  the  hills  along 
the  river  and  over  great  areas  farther  from  the  river.  The  sand  has 
been  blown  and  piled  into  heaps  by  the  wind,  forming  the  "dunes" 
which  are  a  conspicuous  landscape  feature. 

The  Sheyenne  Delta  covers  an  area  of  about  800  square  miles,  be- 
ing mostly  in  Ransom  and  Richland  Counties,  but  extending  also  into 
Cass  and  Sargent  Counties.  From  the  Big  Bend  eight  or  nine  miles 
below  Lisbon  the  Sheyenne  River  flows  north  for  ten  miles  along  the 
western  edge  of  the  delta,  then  flows  east  and  north  across  its  surface, 
leaving  the  delta  front  about  three  miles  south  of  Kindred.  The  town 
of  Sheldon  is  located  on  the  western  edge  of  the  delta  plain,  and  its 
western  edge  extends  from  here  north  about  three  miles  into  Cass 
County.  Thence  the  northern  edge  extends  eastward  a  little  to  the 
north  of  Leonard,  and  eastward  and  southward  near  Walcott,  Colfax, 
and  Barrett,  on  the 'Great  Northern  Railway;  thence  south  to  Moore- 
ton,  on  the  Milnor  branch  of  the  Northern  Pacific  Railway,  and  a  little 
east  of  Hankinson  to  the  Lightning's  Nest,  a  very  large  wind-blown 
sand-hill  or  dune.  The  southern  and  western  edge  of  the  delta  extends 
from  the  Lightning's  Nest  west  and  north  by  Taylor,  Willard,  and 
Swan  Lakes,  to  a  point  about  four  miles  northeast  of  Ransom  in  Sar- 
gent County,  and  from  here  northwest  to  Milnor  and  the  bend  of  the 
Sheyenne  River.  Much  of  the  surface  of  the  delta  is  now  marked  by 
wind-blown  sand  piled  into  dunes  of  all  sizes  from  little  choppy  knolls 
two  to  four  feet  high  to  large  hills  fifty  to  one  hundred  feet  high. 


FIG.  49.     Section  Across  the  Sheyenne  Delta      After  Upham. 

Along  the  northeastern  front  the  waves  of  Lake  Agassiz  cut  a  cliff 
or  bank,  so  that  in  approaching  the  delta  from  the  northeast  the  land- 
scape rises  suddenly  in  passing  from  the  adjoining  prairie  onto  the 
delta  plain  in  some  places  as  much  as  seventy-five  feet.  Figure  49 
shows  a  cross  section  of  the  delta  in  which  the  valley  of  the  Sheyenne 
River  is  shown  at  the  left,  and  near  this  the  Herman  Beach,  which 


THE   DELTAS  AND   BEACHES   OF   LAKE   AGASSIZ. 


95 


marks  the  highest  level  of  Lake  Agassiz.  A  tract  of  dunes  more  than 
ten  miles  across  is  near  the  center  of  the  cut,  and  the  steep  delta  front 
si,xty  to  seventy  feet  high  is  shown  at  the  right. 


FIG.  50.     Delta  on  University  Campus,  Chicago.     Photograph,  1894,  by  the  Author. 

Figure  50  is  a  photograph  of  a  small  delta  which  was  formed  during 
a  single  night.  The  current  of  water  from  under  the  sidewalk  was 
slackened  as  it  poured  out  upon  the  low  fiat  area  in  the  foreground, 
and  the  materials  carried  by  the  little  stream  were  thrown  down  layer 
upon  layer  in  the  same  manner  as  the  sand  and  gravel  of  which  the 
great  Sheyenne  Delta  is  composed. 

The  Pembina  Delta. — The  Pembina  Delta  was  formed  by  the  Pem- 
bina  River  after  the  ice-sheet  had  melted  back  so  as  to  leave  the  Pem- 
bina Mountain  uncovered,  the  delta  lying  along  the  foot  of  that  Moun- 
tain. The  delta  plain  rises  quite  abruptly  from  the  level  prairie  of  the 
valley  bottom  to  the  east,  and  is  locally  known  as  "First  Pembina 
Mountain."  It  covers  an  area  of  about  eighty  square  miles,  or  only 
about  one-tenth  of  that  of  the  Sheyenne  Delta.  Its  average  depth  is 
estimated  to  be  about  150  feet.  The  average  depth  of  the  Sheyenne 
Delta  is  estimated  to  be  about  forty  feet,  so  that  the  volume  of  the  Pem- 
bina Delta  is  more  than  one-third  that  of  the  great  Sheyenne  Delta. 
The  materials  of  which  the  Pembina  Delta  is  composed  are  not  only 
sand  and  gravel  brought  from  the  melting  ice-sheet,  but  shale  from 


96  THE   STORY   OF   THE   PRAIRIES. 

the  underlying  rock-formations  of  Pembina  Mountain,  into  which  the 
river  has  cut  a  very  deep  valley,  and  also  pebbles  of  granite  and  other 
hard  rocks  up  to  six  inches  in  diameter.  Large  boulders  of  granite  lie 
upon  its  surface,  dropped  perhaps  from  blocks  of  floating  ice  from  the 
lake. 

The  delta  extends  from  the  foot  of  Pembina  Mountain  about  four 
miles  south  of  the  International  Boundary  east  and  a  little  south  to 
near  Walhalla,  thence  curving  south  and  east  to  its  widest  point,  and 
south  and  west  to  the  foot  of  Pembina  Mountain  again  a  mile  south 
of  Tongue  River,  being  about  eight  miles  wide  at  its  widest  part.  Its 
western  boundary  thus  lies  along  the  foot  of  Pembina  Mountain.  Its 
highest  point  is  about  six  miles  southwest  of  Walhalla  and  a  little  more 
than  a  mile  south  of  the  Pembina  River.  It  is  here  1,270  feet  above 
sea-level.  The  highest,  or  Herman,  shore-line  of  Lake  Agassiz  is 
about  two  miles  east  of  this  point,  and  about  fifty  feet  lower.  This 
shows  that  the  river  piled  its  burden  of  sand,  gravel,  shale,  and  pebbles 
up  to  a  height  at  the  head  of  the  delta  greater  than  that  of  the  level  of 
the  lake.  The  surface  of  the  delta  slopes  gradually  to  the  north,  east, 
and  south  from  this  highest  point  or  head. 

Along  the  foot  of  the  delta  front  run  the  Norcross,  Tintah,  Camp- 
bell, and  McCauleyville  Beaches,  marking  the  height  of  the  waters  of 
Lake  Agassiz  during  those  stages  of  the  lowering  of  the  lake  imme- 
diately following  that  during  which  the  delta  was  formed, — the  highest 
or  Herman  Stage.  The  waves  of  the  lake  washed  against  the  front  or 
edge  of  the  delta  plateau  and  eroded  the  loose  materials,  forming  a 
steep  bank  or  wave  cliff  which  on  the  northeast  side  of  the  delta  is  more 
than  150  feet  high.  In  crossing  the  delta  from  the  level  prairie  east  of 
Walhalla  to  Olga,  about  twelve  miles  southwest,  after  crossing  well 
marked  McCauleyville  Beaches,  the  road  rises  suddenly  up  the  steep 
face  of  the  wave-washed  and  tree  covered  cliff  150  feet,  from  the  top 
of  which  the  surface  of  the  delta  plain  spreads  out  as  a  great  undulat- 
ing plain  with  scattered  clumps  of  trees  here  and  there.  From  Beau- 
lieu  on  the  delta  plain  the  road  leads  up  the  steep  face  of  Pembina 
Mountain  (called  Second  Mountain,  to  distinguish  it  from  the  delta 
plateau  which  is  called  First  Mountain)  a  height  of  about  300  feet. 
The  outcropping  Cretaceous  shales  are  exposed  by  the  roadsides  and 
in  the  coulees,  and  drift  boulders  of  granite  are  scattered  upon  its  sides. 

Where  the  Pembina  River  cuts  across  the  crest  of  Pembina  Moun- 
tain the  valley  has  been  cut  350  to  450  feet  into  the  soft  shales  and 


THE   DELTAS  AND   BEACHES   OF   LAKE   AGASSIZ. 


97 


clays  which  underlie  the  drift,  and  tributary  streams  which  have  also 
eroded  deep  valleys,  give  to  the  landscape,  which  is  covered  with  trees, 
a  wild  and  picturesque  appearance.  The  delta  plain  or  plateau  is  also 
much  cut  up  by  streams.  The  Pembina  and  Little  Pembina  Rivers 
have  cut  deep  gorges  in  the  delta,  even  cutting  down  into  the  till  which 
underlies  the  delta  and  on  which  it  was  built  upon  the  lake  bottom,  so 
that  a  section  through  the  150  feet  of  delta  sand  and  gravel  is  shown. 
The  Cretaceous  shales  and  clays  (these  belong  to  the  Fort  Pierre  group 
of  the  Cretaceous  series)  are  well  exposed  in  the  sides  of  the  valley  of 
the  Pembina  River  where  it  cuts  through  the  (Second)  Mountain,  and 


FIG.  51.     Section  Showing  Stratified  Sand  of  the  Elk  Valley  Delta.     Erosion  by  Tributary  of 
the  Goose  River.    Photograph,  iqoo,  by  M.  B.  Erickson. 


98  THE   STORY   OF  THE   PRAIRIES. 

farther  down  its  course  the  layers  of  the  delta  sands  and  gravels  are 
similarly  exposed. 

It  is  worthy  of  notice  here  that  what  seems  to  be  a  small  "butte" 
stands  about  a  mile  north  of  the  northern  end  of  the  delta  and  three 
miles  south  of  the  International  Boundary,  a  half  mile  east  of  the  face 
of  Pembina  Mountain.  It  has  much  the  appearance  of  the  small 
rounded  buttes  of  the  Bad  Lands.  It  looks  from  a  distance  much  like 
a  large  haystack,  being  thinly  covered  with  grass.  Badger  holes  near 
its  top  and  on  its  sides  showed  clean  shale  such  as  that  of  the  Mountain, 
If  this  is  its  true  character  it  is  an  outlying  fragment  of  Pembina.  Moun- 
tain, and  so  was  a  tiny  island  in  Lake  Agassiz  when  its  waters  washed 
the  eastern  face  of  the  Mountain.  It  is  interesting  also  as  being  the 
most  eastern  "butte"  in  the  State,  and  perhaps  in  the  United  States. 

The  Elk  Valley  Delta.— The  Elk  Valley  Delta  covers  an  area  of  about 
300  square  miles,  extending  from  McCanna  east  of  Larimore  and  south 
to  Mayville  and  Portland,  and  covering  the  area  west  to  the  shore  of 
Lake  Agassiz.  No  river  which  could  have  formed  this  delta  now 
exists.  The  stream  which  formed  it,  the  glacial  Elk  River,  is  no  more. 
The  reasons  for  thinking  that  such  a  stream  did  once  exist  are  found  in 
the  structure  of  the  delta  itself,  the  materials  of  which  it  is  composed, 
and  the  form- of  the  landscape  near  to  the  delta,  The  delta  is  higher 
north  of  Larimore  and  its  surface  slopes  gently  toward  the  south,  west, 
and  east,  as  though  the  "head"  or  place  where  the  materials  of  which 
it  is  composed  were  poured  into  the  lake  was  at  this  point.  The  mate- 
rials making  up  this  delta  are  of,  a  finer  character  than  those  of  the 
Sheyenne  and  the  Pembina  Deltas,  being  mostly  fine  sand  and  silt 
brought  from  the  ice  of  the  great  ice-sheet,  and  are  not  mixed  with 
shale  graVels  from  the  Cretaceous  rocks  underneath  the  drift,  as  are 
those  of  the  other  deltas.  And  then,  extending  north  from  Larimore 
and  McCanna,  just  where  a  river  ought  to  have  been  to  have  formed 
this  delta  as  it  is,  the  broad  flat  bottomed  valley  extending  for  more 
than  forty  miles  to  Edinburg  and  Gardar  is  what  is  known  in  its 
southern  portion  as  Elk  Valley  and  farther  north  as  Golden  Valley. 
It  is,  however,  all  one  valley,  varying  in  width  from  about  four  miles 
along  the  greater  part  of  what  is  called  Elk  Valley  to  two  miles  at  Ram- 
sey's Grove,  where  begins  the  part,  called  Golden  Valley,  and  this  por- 
tion varies  in  width  from  one  to  two  miles. 

Figure  20  shows  the  positions  of  the  Dakota  and  Minnesota  Gla- 
ciers, or  lobes  of  the  Great  Ice-Sheet,  at  the  time  of  the  formation  of 


THE   DELTAS  AND   BEACHES   OF   LAKE   AGASSIZ. 


99 


FIG.  52.    Angular  Outlines,  not  Passed  over  by  the  Ice-sheet. 
.  Photograph  by  Prof.  T.  C.  Chamber  lin. 


FIG.  53.     Smooth  Outlines,  Showing  Effects  of  Moving  Ice. 
Photograph  by  Prof,  T  C.  Chamber  lin.' 


100 


THE   STORY   OF   THE   PRAIRIES. 


the  Elk  Valley  Delta.  At  this  time  the  Leaf  Hills  Moraine  was  formed 
at  the  edge  of  the  ice.  Remember  what  has  been  said  about  the  thick- 
ness of  the  ice-sheet,  and  that  the  surfaces  of  these  lobes  were  higher 
along  their  axes  or  centers  and  the  ice  thinner  near  the  edges.  The 
arrows  indicate  how  the  ice  spread  out  or  flowed  toward  the  south,  east, 
and  west,  near  the  southern  ends  of  the  lobes. 

There  was  melting  of  the  ice  on  the  surface  of  the  ice-sheet  as  well 
as  at  the  edge.  Water  would  therefore  collect  in  the  hollow  along  the 
line  where  the  two  lobes  met.  When  the  ice-sheet  reached  farther 
south,  as  at  the  time  of  the  formation  of  the  Fergus  Falls  Moraine,  the 
ice  extended  across  from  one  lobe  to  the  other,  in  the  region  shown  in 
Figure  20.  As  the  ice  melted  and  the  edge  came  to  be  farther  back  a 
hollow  came  to  be  upon  the  surface  of  the  ice-sheet.  At  the  time  the 
Leaf  Hills  Moraine  was  being  formed  a  large  stream  flowed  in  the  hol- 
low where  the  two  glaciers  met,  having  its  bottom  and  sides  of  ice. 
This  was  the  glacial  Elk  River. 

Soon  the  ice  valley  became  deeper  from  the  melting  due  to  the 
stream  and  from  the  melting  at  the  edges  of  the  lobes.  The  sand  and 
silt  which  were  elsewhere  left  at  the  edge  of  the  ice  as  moraines  were 
washed  away  by  the  swiftly  flowing  river.  This  was  added  to  the  ma- 
terial of  the  delta. 

In  time,  however,  this  glacial  river  came  to  flow  upon  the  ground 
between  the  two  glaciers,  being  kept  at  high  flood  by  the  waters  from 
the  melting  ice,  which  poured  in  from  both  sides.  As  the  ice  of  the  two 
glacier  edges  on  each  side  of  the  hollow  kept  moving  toward  each 
other,  and  each  delivered  its  burden  of  sand  and  silt,  a  large  amount  of 
earth  material  was  left  along  the  course  of  the  stream  only  to  be  quickly 
carried  away  by  the  rapid  current  of  the  stream  which  was  constantly 
renewed  by  the  inpouring  of  waters  from  the  ice.  So  it  would  seem 
that  the  conditions  must  have  been  such  as  to  form  a  large  river  bur- 
dened with  a  great  load  of  earth,  and  when  the  still  waters  of  the  lake 
were  entered  a  delta  must  result. 


FIG.  54.    Profile  of  "  the  Ridge  "  and  Beaches  at  Inkster.    After  Upham. 


THE  DELTAS  AND  BEACHES  OF  LAKE  AGASSIZ.         1Q.1. 

There  was,  however,  more  drift  piled  into  this  valley  from  the  melt- 
ing ice  than  could  be  carried  away  by  the  river.  The  wdst  side  of  the 
valley  is  the  highland  of  Cretaceous  rocks  which  for,nred>;tne  we-stenv 
boundary  of  Lake  Agassiz.  Along  the  top  of  this  hi-ghla/id  was' left  the. 
Leaf  Hills  Moraine  of  the  Dakota  Glacier.  On  the  east  side  of  the 
valley  the  Minnesota  Glacier  piled  its  moraine,  a  chain  of  hills  which  is 
now  locally  known  in  its  southern  portion  as  "The  Ridge"  and  the 
northern  part  as  "The  Mountains."  This  chain  of  hills  extends  from 
McCanna  north  to  Edinburg,  a  distance  of  about  thirty-five  miles.  "The 
Ridge"  is  a  series  of  three  morainic  hills  from  one  to  three  miles  in 
length  and  from  a  half  mile  to  three-fourths  of  a  mile  in  width.  "The 
Mountains"  are  two  long,  large  hills,  one  about  six  miles  long,  lying 
west  of  Conway,  the  other  about  fourteen  miles  long  and  two  to  three 
miles  wide,  lying  west  of  Park  River  and  extending  north  to  Edin- 
burg. 

After  the  Leaf  Hills  stage  of  Lake  Agassiz,  when  the  ice-sheet  had 
receded  to  the  position  of  the  Itasca  Moraine,  this  chain  of  hills  formed 
islands  in  Lake  Agassiz,  and  the  valley  of  the  Elk  River  was  a  great 
sound  or  strait  between  these  islands  and  the  western  shore  of  the 
lake.  This  is  shown  by  the  beach  ridges  which  mark  the  height  of  the 
water  on  the  sides  of  the  islands  and  the  west  shore  of  Elk  Valley. 
Figures  54  and  55  show  profiles  across  the  Elk  and  Golden  Valleys, 
the  Ridge  and  the  Mountains,  and  the  upper  beaches  of  the  Lake. 


Tlie    Mount  a\ns"  Island. 
I  Mo-1-airnC.Ti  U 

/^arx^S^H.&Hcvr 


FlG.  55.     Profile  across  Beaches  at  Park  River  and  Westward. 
Horizontal  scale,  3  miles  to  an  inch.    After  Upham. 

The  northern  mountain  is  crossed  by  the  south  branch  of  Park 
River,  west  of  the  city  of  Park  River,  in  a  well-marked  valley.  Farther 
south  to  the  west  of  Conway  and  Inkster  is  a  gap  two  or  three  miles 
wide  between  the  southern  mountain  and  the  northern  hill  of  the  ridge. 
The  three  branches  of  Forest  River  send  their  waters  through  this  gap 
after  they  have  united  into  one  stream,  cutting  across  the  beach  ridges 


102  THE   STORY   OF   THE   PRAIRIES. 

which  extend  along  the  east  side  of  the  chain  of  hills.  West  of  Orr  the 
ridge  is  broken  in  two,  but  Lost  Creek,  which  is  formed  by  several 
small  tributaries  from  the  higher  land  west  of  the  shore  of  Lake  Agas- 
si?:, fails'  to  flow  across  but  becomes  "lost"  on  the  flat,  marshy  prairie — 
trie  old  sand  and  silt  bottom  of  the  Elk  Valley. 

Between  these  islands  were  straits  or  necks  of  water  connecting  the 
main  lake  with  the  large  sound  west  of  the  islands.  The  bottom  of 
Elk  and  Golden  Valleys  is  a  level  tract  forty  miles  in  length  and  from 
one  to  four  miles  in  width  with  no  stream  on  its  bottom  representing 
the  great  Elk  River  which  once  surged  down  its  course  and  built  the 
broad  delta  at  its  mouth.  It  has  so  little  slope  that  no  stream  flows 
upon  the  level  bottom  for  more  than  a  few  miles.  In  fact,  Lost  Creek, 
after  it  enters  the  flat  bottom  of  this  valley,  struggles  toward  the  north 
instead  of  south  in  the  direction  of  the  Elk  River,  and  after  two  or 
three  miles  gives  up  and  becomes  a  marsh.  West  of  the  northern 
mountain  several  small  streams  flow  into  the  valley  from  the  highland 
to  the  west  and  become  "lost,"  spreading  out  into  a  marsh. 

The  Pembina  Delta  was  formed  after  the  ice  of  the  Great  Ice-Sheet 
had  melted  back  so  that  Lake  Agassiz  extended  north  beyond  the 
International  Boundary  to  the  city  of  Winnipeg,  but  the  lake  remained 
at  about  the  same  level,  for  the  same  beaches  which  run  across  the 
eastern  side  and  along  the  front  of  the  Elk  Valley  Delta  also  cross  the 
eastern  side  and  run  along  the  steep  front  of  the  Pembina  Delta.  And 
the  Herman  Beach,  which  marks  the  highest  level  of  the  lake,  runs 
along  the  western  or  shore  side  of  both  deltas.  And  similarly  the  Nor- 
cross,  Tintah  and  Campbell  Beaches  run  across  the  eastern  side  of  the 
Sheyenne  Delta,  and  the  McCauleyville  Beach  along  its  front,  while 
the  Herman  Beach  runs  near  its  western  or  shore  side.  The  highest 
or  Herman  stage  of  Lake  Agassiz  therefore  continued  during  the  sev- 
eral stages  of  "retreat"  or  melting  of  the  ice-sheet,  which  are  marked 
by  the  Dovre,  Fergus  Falls,  Leaf  Hills  and  Itasca  Moraines.  The 
stages  of  Lake  Agassiz  should,  therefore,  not  be  confused  with  the 
stages  of  retreat  or  melting  of  the  ice-sheet. 

Stages  and  Beaches. — It  has  been  previously  explained  how  Lake 
Agassiz  came  into  existence  by  the  hemming  in  of  the  waters  of  the 
melting  ice-sheet  by  the  higher  lands  which  formed  the  sides  of  a  great 
pre-glacial  valley.  These  formed  the  shore  boundaries  of  the  lake  on 
the  east,  west  and  south,  while  the  great  wall  of  ice  formed  its  northern 
shore.  Since  the  lowest  place  in  the  rim  of  the  surrounding  highlands 


THE   DELTAS   AND   BEACHES   OF   LAKE  AGASSIZ.  103 

was  at  the  south  here  was  established  the  first  outlet.  And  the  waters 
must  needs  find  escape  to  the  sea  to  the  south  because  the  great  ice- 
sheet  prevented  any  drainage  toward  the  north.  The  first  great  stage 
of  the  lake  was  begun  when  the  ice  had  melted  back  to  the  position  of 
the  Fergus  Falls  Moraine.  During  this  time  the  highest  beach  or 
shore  line,  known  as  the  Herman  Beach,  began  to  be  formed.  As  has 
been  before  explained  the  Sheyenne  Delta  began,  to  be  built  up  as  soon 
as  the  lake  began,  and  its  level  had  not  changed  much  when  the  Elk 
Valley  and  Pembina  Deltas  were  formed.  The  outlet  of  the  lake  was 
across  the  soft  drift  materials  of  the  Dovre  Moraine.  Lake  Traverse 
now  lies  in  the  north  end  of  the  old  outlet  channel,  near  the  southeast 
corner  of  North  Dakota  and  on  the  boundary  between  the  states  of 
South  Dakota  and  Minnesota.  The  lake  grew  larger  by  the  melting 
of  the  ice-sheet,  or  the  "retreating"  of  the  ice-wall  which  formed  the 
northern  shore.  The  water  remained  at  the  same  height  during  all  the 
time  the  lake  was  increasing  in  size,  the  outlet  channel  being  cut  down 
during  the  time  five  or  ten  feet. 

The  beach  which  marks  the  next  lower  stage  or  level  of  the  lake  is 
the  Norcross.  At  the  time  this  beach  was  formed  the  level  of  the  lake 
was  about  twenty  feet  lower  than  during  the  time  of  the  formation  of 
the  Herman  Beach,  the  outlet  having  been  cut  down  this  amount.  The 
lake  stood  at  this  level  for  quite  a  long  time,  as  is  shown  by  the  well- 
defined  shore  lines  or  beaches.  Then  the  outlet  was  cut  clown  again 
about  fifteen  feet,  causing  a  lowering  of  the  lake  this  much  below  the 
Norcross  stage.  At  this  level  the  higher  of  two  Tintah  Beaches  was 
formed,  followed  by  another  lowering  of  the  water-level  of  about  fifteen 
feet  and  the  forming  of  the  lower  Tintah  Beach.  Again  the  level  of  the 
water  was  lowered  about  fifteen  or  twenty  feet  and  the  Campbell  Beach 
was  formed.  And  finally  about  the  same  amount  of  cutting  down  of 
the  outlet  brought  the  level  to  the  lowest  stage  while  yet  the  waters 
escaped  to  the  south,  the  McCauleyville  Beach  being  formed  at  this 
lowest  level.  Thus  a  beach  was  formed  at  each  stage  of  the  lake. 

The  names  of  these  beaches  are  a  little  awkward,  and  have  no  mean- 
ing except  that  they  are  names.  They  were  applied  to  the  beaches 
from  towns  which  are  built  upon  the  beaches  or  which  are  near  to  them. 
The  five  names  applied  to  the  higher  beaches  of  the  lake  are  the  names 
of  towns  in  Minnesota.  Other  and  lower  beaches  were  named  from 
towns  in  North  Dakota  and  Manitoba,  as  the  Blanchard,  the  Hills- 


104  THE   STORY    OF   THE   PRAIRIES. 

boro,  Emerado,  etc.,  in  North  Dakota,  and  Gladstone,  Burnside,  etc., 
in  Manitoba. 

The  next  lower  stage  than  the  McCauleyville  was  about  twenty 
feet  below  the  bottom  of  the  southern  outlet  channel,  and  the  melting 
of  the  ice  at  the  north  had  allowed  the  waters  to  find  escape  by  another 
outlet.  At  this  time  were  formed  the  Blanchard  Beaches,  and  it  is 
known  as  the  Blanchard  stage  of  the  lake.  The  outlet  was  probably 
to  the  northeast,  the  waters  escaping  into  Lake  Superior,  thence  to 
Lake  Ontario,  and  by  way  of  the  Mohawk  Valley  and  the  Hudson 
River  to  the  Atlantic  Ocean.  The  ice  had  not  yet  melted  off  from  the 
Valley  of  the  St.  Lawrence  and  hence  escape  of  the  waters  by  that 
course  was  impossible. 

It  was  noted  above  that  during  the  time  of  the  forming  of  the  Her- 
man Beach  the  outlet  channel  was  cut  down  only  five  or  ten  feet,  al- 
though the  water  stood  for  a  considerable  time  at  this  level.  Then  while 
the  outlet  was  being  cut  down  fifteen  or  twenty  feet  no  shore  line  what- 
ever was  formed.  While  the  water  stood  at  this  second  level,  the  Nor- 
cross  stage,  another  beach  was  formed.  Again  the  outlet  cut  down 
rapidly,  leaving  no  beach  ridges  on  the  shores  because  the  water  did 
not  stand  at  any  one  level  long  enough  for  the  waves  to  pile  up  a  shore 
ridge.  This  is  the  upper  beach  of  the  Tintah  stage.  Again  the  outlet 
deepens  suddenly  while  no  shore  lines  are  formed,  and  then  the  water 
stands  at  the  second  level  of  the  Tintah  stage  while  the  lower  Tintah 
beach  is  forming.  Then,  still  again  is  the  outlet  cut  down  rapidly  to 
the  Campbell  stage,  and  the  Campbell  Beach.  And  finally  another 
lowering  of  the  outlet  to  the  McCauleyville  stage,  when  the  last  beach 
was  formed  while  the  waters  discharged  by  the  southern  outlet. 

But  the  next  level  of  the  lake  is  below  the  bottom  of  the  outlet.  It 
was  not,  then,  the  cutting  down  of  the  outlet  channel  which  caused 
these  changes  of  level  of  the  lake,  for  this  outlet  could  not  drain  the 
lake  below  its  own  bottom.  It  is  evident,  therefore,  that  some  other 
outlet  had  been  found  for  the  waters  at  a  lower  point  in  the  rim  of  the 
lake.  This  occurred  when  the  ice  melted  back  at  the  north  so  as  to  un- 
cover a  lower  place  in  the  surrounding  highlands  which  kept  the  waters 
hemmed  in.  This,  however,  does  not  explain  why  the  lake  stood  at 
certain  levels  long  enough  for  the  waves  to  build  up  distinct  beach 
ridges  while  the  outlet  was  cut  down  but  little,  and  then  the  outlet  cut 
down  so  rapidly  that  the  waves  left  no  shore  marks  at  all. 

The  outlet  was  changed  and  the  old  River  Warren  became  an  aban- 


THE   DELTAS   AND    BEACHES   OF   LAKE   AGASSIZ. 


105 


doned  channel.  This  is  shown  by  the  fact  that  those  beaches  which 
were  formed  after  the  McCauleyville  stage,  the  lowest  stage  while  the 
waters  were  drained  to  the  south  by  the  River  Warren,  run  across  the 
axis  or  central  part  of  the  old  lake  bottom  (where  is  now  the  Red 
River  of  the  North)  instead  of  running  down  along  either  side  of  the 
old  channel,  as  do  the  McCauleyville  and  the  higher  beaches. 


O  4?£ 


FIG.  56.     During  the  Higher  Stages  the  Lake  Outflowed  Southward.     The  Lower  Beaches 
Cross  the  Red  River  of  the  North. 

Figure  56  shows  the  relation  of  the  higher  beaches  formed  while 
the  lake  discharged  toward  the  south  and  the  first  two  (Blanchard) 
beaches  formed  after  the  lake  had  ceased  to  overflow  southward  and 
had  formed  a  lower  outlet  into  Lake  Superior. 

The  explanation  of  these  rather  remarkable  things  is  somewhat  dif- 
ficult, and  those  who'  do  not  care  to  attempt  to  follow  it  may  omit  the 
next  few  pages. 

Causes  of  These  Changes. — The  cause  of  these  changes  of  level  of  the 
lake  is  a,  somewhat  difficult  one  to  understand.  It  is  no  less  a  matter 
than  changes  in  the  form  of  the  earth's  crust,  changes  in  the  altitude  or 
level  of  the  surface  of  the  earth  itself.  It  has  been  observed  that  in  fol- 


106 


THE    STORY   OF   THE   PRAIRIES. 


lowing  the  beach  lines  from  south  to  north  that  they  are  not  simple  or 
single  ridges  at  the  north  as  they  are  in  their  southern  parts,  but  they 
become  double  and  multiple  as  they  are  followed  northward.  The  Her- 
man Beach,  for  instance,  which  is  a  single  ridge  in  its  southern  portion, 
becomes  five  distinct  beaches  near  Maple  Lake  in  Minnesota,  and  still 
farther  north  in  Manitoba  becomes  seven  distinct  beaches.  And  simi- 
lar facts  are  observed  on  the  west  side  of  the  lake.  The  five  beaches 
near  Maple  Lake  are  separated  from  each  other  by  vertical  distances 


FIG.  57.     Map  of  Portion  of  the  Herman  and  Norcross  Beaches,  near  Maple  Lake,  Minn.,  showing 

the  Multiple  Character  Northward.     The  five  Herman  Beaches  become  one  Beach, 

and  the  four  Norcross  Beaches  one. 

of  eight,  fifteen,  thirty  and  forty-five  feet;  that  is,  the  highest  Herman 
Beach  is  there  eight  feet  higher  than  the  next  lower,  that  is,  fifteen  feet 
higher  than  the  next  lower  than  this,  making  the  highest  twenty-three 
feet  above  the  third  one,  and  this  third  one  in  turn  is  thirty  feet  higher 
than  the  fourth,  making  fifty-three  feet  from  the  highest  to  the  fourth 
lower,  and  the  fourth  is  forty-five  feet  higher  than  the  fifth,  so  that 
the  first  or  highest  is  ninety-eight  feet  higher  than  the  fifth  or  lowest. 
And  all  these  merge  into  the  one  single  Herman  Beach  in  the  southern 
portion  of  the  lake.  Similarly  the  Norcross  Beach,  which  is  a  single 


THE   DELTAS   AND   BEACHES   OF   LAKE   AGASSIZ. 


107 


FIG.  58.     Diagram  Showing  the  Progressive  Elevation  of  Beaches  Northward  in  Vicinity  of  Maple 

Lake,  Minn.    Continue  the  lines  to  the  right  and  the  upper  five  meet  in 

one,  and  the  lower  four  in  one. 

beach  ridge  in  the  southern  portion,  becomes  double  at  the  north,  as 
does  also  the  Tintah,  while  the  Campbell  and  McCanleyville  Beaches 
each  become  separated  into  three  distinct  ridges  at  the  north. 

The  five  stages  of  the  lake,  while  it  discharged  its  waters  by  the 
southern  outlet,  are  represented  in  the  southern  portion  by  the  five 
beaches  named,  the  Herman,  Norcross,  Tintah,  Campbell  and  McCau- 
leyville.  These  five  beaches  in  the  south  are  represented  by  seventeen 
beaches  in  the  north.  The  highest,  or  Herman  Beach,  near  the  old  out- 
let at  Lake  Traverse,  is  about  90  feet  higher  than  the  lowest  or  Mc- 
Cauleyville  Beach,  while  the  vertical  distance  between  the  highest  of 
the  Herman  beaches,  300  miles  to  the  north,  and  the  lowest  McCauley- 
ville  Beach  is  nearly  300  feet.  In  traversing  these  beaches  from  south 
toward  the  north  it  is  observed  that  they  rise  gradually  northward. 
They  were  formed  at  the  waters  edge  and  were  therefore  in  the  first 
place  level.*  The  ascent  or  rise  is  more  gradual  toward  the  south  and 
more  rapid  toward  the  north.  The  uplift  of  the  crust  of  the  earth  was, 
therefore,  going  on  at  the  time  Lake  Agassiz  was  here  and  forming  the 
beaches,  and  it,  the  uplift,  was  greater  toward  the  north. 

The  movement  of  elevation  of  the  country  at  Lake  Traverse  during 
the  time  of  formation  of  the  five  beaches  while  Lake  Agassiz  outflowed 
to  the  south  was  about  ninety  feet.  On  the  International  Boundary  at 
Pembina  Mountain  it  was  265  feet.  At  Gladstone,  in  Manitoba,  about 
350  feet,  and  200  miles  north  of  the  International  Boundary  on  the  east 
side  of  Duck  Mountain,  nearly  500  feet. 

*  The  surface  of  the  lake  was  not  perfectly  level,  for  the  waters  were  drawn 
by  the  attraction  of  the  great  mass  of  ice  toward  the  north,  making  the  water  "pile 
up"  toward  the  north,  and  hence  the  shore  lines  would  ris.e  a  little  in  going  north, 
but  for  our  study  they  may  be  considered  as  horizontal. 


108  THE   STORY   OF   THE    PRAIRIES. 

To  explain  these  remarkable  changes  of  level  it  is  necessary  to  con- 
sider a  somewhat  difficult  geological  problem,  that  of  the  changes  of 
level  of  the  earth's  crust  before  referred  to.  This  is  the  rising  in  one 
place  and  sinking  in  another,  over  large  areas,  or  regional  elevation  and 
subsidence,  called  "epeirogenic  movements,"  of  the  crust  of  the  earth. 

That  the  form  of  the  earth's  outer  layers  or  "crust"  is  not  fixed  or 
"solid"  is  a  well  established  fact.  The  sea  creeps  upon  the  land,  or 
withdraws  from  the  shore  as  the  land  rises  or  sinks,  very  slowly,  to  be 
sure,  but  none  the  less  truly.  The  movement  is  more  easily  recognized 
at  the  seashore  because  the  sea-level  forms  a  convenient  base-line  for  mak- 
ing comparisons.  It  is  thought  that  the  great  basin  in  which  Hudson's 
Bay  lies  is  being  uplifted  at  the  present  time,  probably  a  continuation 
of  the  same  great  movement  by  which  the  beaches  of  Lake  Agassiz 
were  lifted  out  of  their  level  positions.  This  uplift  of  the  basin  of  Hud- 
son's Bay  has  been  estimated  to  be  from  five  to  ten  feet  in  a  century.* 

If  the  great  weight  of  the  vast  ice-sheet  caused  the  crust  of  the 
earth  to  bend  down  or  sink,  then  the  melting  of  the  ice  and  the  flowing 
away  of  the  water  would  relieve  the  pressure  and  so  allow  it  to  rise 
again.  The  ice  was  deeper  at  the  north  and  the  rise  of  the  land,  as  we 
have  seen,  was  much  greater  at  the  north. 

The  Herman  stage  of  Lake  Agassiz  represents  that  period  of  the 
lake  during  which  all  the  beaches  at  the  north  which  unite  into  the 
one  Herman  Beach  near  the  outlet  at  Lake  Traverse  were  formed. 
But  during  all  this  time  the  water  was  pouring  out  at  the  Lake  Traverse 
outlet  without  cutting  the  channel  down  very  much,  which  means  that 
the  current  was  not  very  swift  at  the  outlet.  The  elevation  at  the  north 
may  be  likened  to  the  slow  tipping  of  a  broad  pan  or  dish  filled  with 
water  so  as  to  just  keep  the  water  steadily  flowing  out  at  the  side. 
But  then  there  followed  a  more  sudden  and  widespread  elevation  which 
affected  the  whole  area  of  the  lake.  The  whole  basin  was  lifted  up, 
which  had  the  effect  to  increase  the  rate  of  flow  of  water  at  the  outlet, 
and  so  the  channel  \vas  cut  down  rapidly  to  the  level  of  the  next  stage 
of  the  lake,  the  Norcross  stage. 

Here  the  same  process  was  repeated,  the  outlet  staying  just  about 
the  same  during  the  time  that  the  several  Norcross  Beaches  were  being 
formed  at  the  north.  These  beaches,  like  those  of  the  Herman  stage, 
unite  into  one  in  the  southern  portion  of  the  lake,  showing  that  the 

*  Dr.  Robert  Bell. 


THE   DELTAS   AND   BEACHES   OF   LAKE   AGASSIZ.  109 

uplift  during  this  stage  did  not  extend  to  the  southern  end  of  the  lake. 
The  close  of  the  Norcross  stage  is  marked  by  another  comparatively 
sudden  uplift  of  the  whole  lake  bottom,  followed  again  by  the  rapid 
cuttino-  down  of  the  outlet  channel. 

o 

This  series  of  changes,  viz.,  the  uplifting  of  the  northern  portion 
of  (the  lake  area  during  the  time  of  each  stage  while  the  outlet  remained 
at  'just  about  the  same  depth,  followed  by  a  somewhat  sudden  uplifting 
of  the  whole  region  of  the  lake  so  that  the  water  passing  through  the 
outlet  channel  increased  in  speed  so  as  to  cut  down  its  depth  a  consider- 
able amount,  to  the  level  marking  the  next  lower  stage,  continued  dur- 
ing the  five  great  stages  while  the  outlet  remained  at  the  south.  The 
two  Tintah  Beaches  at  the  southern  outlet  mark  substages,  there  being 
a  lowering  of  the  outlet  between  the  two  periods  of  the  Tintah  stage 
when  the  two*  beaches  were  formed. 

Finally,  at  the  close  of  the  McCauleyville  or  lowest  stage  of  the  lake 
while  the  outlet  remained  at  the  south  the  uplifting  of  the  bottom  coin- 
cided with  the  uncovering  of  a  place  in  the  rim  of  the  lake  lower  than 
the  bottom  of  the  Lake  Traverse  outlet,  and  so  the  outlet  was  changed 
to  the  northeast. 

The  several  beaches  at  the  north  which  belong  to  one  stage  and 
which  unite  to  form  one  at  the  south,  mark  intervals  of  quiet  or  pauses 
in  the  uplifting  which  affected  the  more  northern  region  only  and  not 
the  whole  area  of  the  lake.  This  means  that  the  uplifting  was  progres- 
sively greater  toward  the  north. 

The  succeeding  beaches,  which  mark  the  stages  of  the  lake  after 
the  water  had  ceased  to  be  discharged  by  the  southern  outlet,  are  three 
Blanchard  Beaches,  representing  three  stages  of  the  lake,  each  being 
lower  than  the  preceding,  the  first  being  fifteen  feet  lower  than  the 
McCauleyville  Beach,  the  second  twenty  feet  lower  than  the  first,  the 
third  fifteen  feet  lower  than  the  second,  the  Hillsboro  twelve  or  fifteen 
feet  lower  still,  the  Emerado  thirty  feet,  the  Ojata  twenty-five  feet,  the 
Gladstone  twenty  feet,  the  Burnside  twenty  feet,  the  Ossawa  fifteen 
feet,  the  Stonewall  twenty  feet,  the  Niverville  forty-five  feet/ and  from 
the  Niverville  Beach  still  another  fall  of  forty-five  feet  reaches  the 
earliest  level  of  Lake  Winnipeg,  and  the  cutting  down  of  the  Nelson 
River  outlet  has  lowered  Lake  Winnipeg  still  further  twenty  feet. 

Let  us  now  briefly  review  the  history  of  Lake  Agassiz.  The  lake 
first  began  as  a  body  of  water  from  one  to  three  miles  wide  and  about 
thirty  miles  long,  and  was  little  more  than  a  broadening  of  the  Shey- 


110  THE   STORY    OF   THE   PRAIRIES. 

enne  River.  The  melting  back  of  the  ice-sheet  to  the  position  of  the 
Fergus  Falls  Moraine  increased  the  size  of  the  lake  and  the  first  and 
highest  Herman  stage  of  the  lake  was  ushered  in.  When  the  ice 
melted  back  to  the  position  of  the  Leaf  Hills  Moraine  it  became  still 
larger;  and  again  the  rapid  recession  of  the  ice  to  the  Itasca  Moraine 
increased  its  area  still  further.  And  when  the  Mesabi  Moraine  was 
formed  the  lake  extended  to  the  southern  ends  of  Lakes  Winnipeg  and 
Manitoba,  and  still  later  embraced  all  the  vast  territory  adjacent  to 
these  lakes.  Most  of  the  melting  away  of  the  ice  occurred  during  the 
time  of  the  formation  of  the  Herman  and  Norcross  Beaches,  as  these 
beaches  have  been  traced  from  Maple  Lake,  Minnesota,  south  to  Lake 
Traverse,  and  north  through  North  Dakota  to  Duck  Mountain  in 
Manitoba,  a  distance  of  more  than  700  miles. 

The  deltas  which  have  been  described,  the  Sheyenne,  Elk  Valley 
and  Pembina,  and  also  the  Buffalo  and  Sand  Hill  Deltas  in  Minnesota, 
and  the  great  Assiniboine  Delta  in  Manitoba,  were  formed  mostly  dur- 
ing this  earlier  time  of  the  lake,  as  they  are  crossed  by  the  Herman 
and  Norcross  Beaches,  whereas  the  others  which  mark  lower  levels 
of  the  lake  mostly  pass  around  them,  leaving  them  to  the  landward. 

The  changes  in  level  of  the  lake  were  caused  by  changes  in  the  form 
of  the  earth's  crust,  an  uplifting  of  the  floor  of  the  lake  causing  more 
rapid  cutting  down  of  the  outlet  and  draining  away  of  the  water,  the 
successive  stages  or  levels  of  the  lake  being  marked  by  shore  lines  or 
beach  ridges.  The  northern  portion  was  uplifted  more  than  the  south- 
ern portion,  as  is  shown  by  the  beaches  which  become  double  and  mul- 
tiple at  the  north.  Finally  the  floor  of  the  lake  was  uplifted  so  that 
escape  of  the  waters  by  the  southern  outlet  was  cut  off  and  the  waters 
overflowed  to  the  northeast,  the  ice  melting  at  the  north  so  as  to  allow 
the  waters  to  escape  by  a  new  outlet  at  the  same  time  the  outlet  to  the 
south  was  elevated.  Successive  stages  in  the  level  of  the  lake  are  marked 
by  beaches. 

At  the  time  of  formation  of  the  Gladstone  Beach  the  southern  point 
of  the  lake  was  about  as  far  south  as  Buxton,  the  Red  River  of  the 
North  flowing  into  the  lake  there.  The  western  shore  of  the  lake  in 
North  Dakota  is  marked  by  the  Gladstone  Beach  west  of  Grafton  and 
Minto.  At  the  time  of  the  formation  of  the  Niverville  Beach  the  lake 
did  not  extend  south  of  the  International  Boundary,  and  the  Red  River 
of  the  North  flowed  into  the  lake  near  Morris,  Manitoba,  twenty-five 
miles  north  of  Neche  and.  Pembina.  The  entire  area  covered  by  Lake 


THE   DELTAS  AND   BEACHES   OF   LAKE   AGASSIZ.  Ill 

Agassiz  was  about  110,000  square  miles,  or  an  area  equal  to  more  than 
one  and  a  half  times  the  whole  State  of  North  Dakota,  and  the  greater 
part  of  this  vast  expanse  was  covered  during  the  highest  or  Herman 
stage  of  the  lake.  The  depth  of  the  waters  of  Lake  Agassiz  above  the 
present  surface  of  the  south  end  of  Lake  Winnipeg  during  its  higher 
Herman  stages  was  about  600  feet.  At  the  time  the  waters  ceased  to 
discharge  by  the  southern  outlet  and  began  to  overflow  toward  the 
northeast  the  depth  at  this  point  was  about  300  feet.  At  the  time  of 
the  Niverville  stage,  the  last  before  the  waters  fell  to  the  highest  level 
of  Lake  Winnipeg,  the  depth  was  about  sixty-five  feet.  Finally  the  ice 
disappeared,  uncovering  the  present  Nelson  River  outlet  and  the 
waters  lowered  to  the  highest  level  of  Lake  Winnipeg,  and  then  by  the 
cutting  down  of  the  Nelson  River  channel  the  waters  were  lowered  to 
the  present  level  of  Lakes  Winnipeg,  Manitoba  and  Winnipegosis, 
which  remain  as  a  last  vestige  of  the  once  great  Lake  Agassiz. 


CHAPTER  THE  TENTH. 

OTHER  EXTINCT  GLACIAL  LAKES. 

Glacial  Lake  Souris.— Glacial  Lake  Souris  occupied  the  Valley  of  the 
Souris,  or  Mouse  River,  from  which  river  it  gets  its  name.  It  was 
formed  by  the  waters  from  the  melting  ice-sheet,  as  was  Lake  Agassiz, 
and,  like  that  lake,  had  the  wall  of  ice  for  its  northern  shore,  the  ice 
acting  as  a  dam  preventing  the  escape  of  the  waters  northward. 

After  the  ice  had  melted  .back  from  the  position  of  the  First  or  Al- 
tamont  Moraine,  the  waters  began  to  fill  the  basin  between  the  higher 
land  along  the  eastern  front  of  the  great  Missouri  Plateau,  the  Coteau 
du  Missouri,  and  the  edge  of  the  ice.  The  First  or  Altamont  Moraine 
lies  on  the  top  of  the  eastern  portion  of  the  great  plateau,  extending  in 
a  northwest  and  southeast  direction  across  Ward  and  McHenry 
Counties,  being  crossed  by  the  Great  Northern  Railway  between  Tagus 
(Wallace)  and  Palermo,  the  distance  between  these  stations  represent- 
ing the  width  of  the  Moraine.  West  of  Balfonr  and  Anamoo'se  the 
high  hills  of  the  Second  or  Gary  Moraine  appear,  marking  the  second 
halting  place  of  the  edge  of  the  Dakota  Glacier  or  lobe  of  the  ice-sheet 
as  it  slowly  melted  off  from  the  landscape.  It  was  probably  in  the  inter- 
val between  the  times  of  formation  of  these  two  moraines  that  Lake 
Souris  began,  being  at  first  a  long,  narrow  lake  fed  by  the  waters  flow- 
ing directly  from  the  melting  ice-sheet  and  the  then  great  glacial  river, 
the  Des  Lacs.  The  upper  course  of  the  Souris  or  Mouse  River  was 
probably  at  this  time  covered  by  the  ice. 

The  earliest  outlet  of  Lake  Souris  was  to  the  south  by  the  broad 
valley  which  extends  from  near  Velva  at  the  southern  point  of  the  Ox- 
Bow  or  Big  Bend  of  the  Mouse  River  south  and  west  of  Balfour  and 
Anamoose,  and  then  conducted  the  waters  across  to  the  Missouri 
River  probably  by  Pony  Gulch,  or  the  channel  to  the  west  of  Dog 
Den  Butte,  in  which  lie  Strawberry,  Long  and  Crooked  Lakes,  form- 
ing a  channel  across  the  great  Altamont  Moraine.  This  valley  south 
from  Velva  is  a  broad,  level  tract  of  prairie,  low  in  many  places  and 
covered  with  lakes  and  hay-sloughs.  It  varies  in  width  from  a  quarter 
to  a  half  mile  or  more.  That  this  was  the  outlet  for  a  considerable  time 

112 


113 


114  THE    STORY    OF   THE    PRAIRIES. 

is  shown  by  the  fact  that  the  old  channel  is  well  marked,  having  clearly 
defined  banks  and  a  broad,  flat  bottom. 

After  the  ice  had  melted  back  farther,  probably  to  the  position  of 
the  Fourth  or  Kiester  Moraine,  and  at  the  time  when  the  edge  of  the 
great  ice-sheet  rested  upon  the  high  hills  south  of  Devils  Lake,  the 
outlet  was  changed  so  that  the  waters  escaped  by  the  channel  of  the 
present  Big  Coulee  and  Girard  and  Buffalo  Lakes  to  the  upper  course 
of  the  James  River. 

This  old  outlet  channel  is  about  125  feet  deep  and  a  third  of  a  mile 
wide.  The  Big  Coulee,  which  now  occupies  this  valley,  is  one  of  the 
head  streams  of  the  Sheyenne  River.  A  well  marked  channel  a  half 
mile  in  width  leads  across  from  the  valley  of  the  Sheyenne  to  the  valley 
of  the  James  in  northern  Wells  County,  by  which  the  waters  of  Lake 
Souris  were  carried  to  the  James  Valley  from  the  upper  course  of  the 
Sheyenne,  the  lower  valley  of  the  latter  being  at  this  time  still  buried 
beneath  the  ice.  This  old  channel  connecting  the  Sheyenne  and  James 
Valleys  is  now  a  "dry"  waterway.  In  time  of  high  water  there  is  a 
stream  on  its  bottom  flowing  toward  the  Sheyenne,  the  valley  of  the 
Sheyenne  being  now  a  deeper  and  larger  valley  than  that  of  the  James. 
The  Big  Coulee  now  extends  as  a  well  marked  valley  to>  within  about 
twelve  miles  of  the  Mouse  River.  Here,  then,  is  an  old  waterway,  from 
the  basin  of  Lake  Souris  to  the  Valley  of  the  James,  fifty  miles  in 
extent,  in  which  now  lie  the  Big  Coulee,  and  Girard  and  Buffalo  Lakes, 
the  upper  valley  of  the  Sheyenne  and  the  abandoned  channel  which 
connects  the  valleys  of  the  Sheyenne  and  James  Rivers. 

Afterward,  when  the  ice-sheet  had  melted  back  so  that  its  edge 
extended  from  west  of  the  Turtle  Mountains  to  the  high  hills  south  of 
Devils  Lake,  and  south  and  east  through  Nelson,  Steele  and  Barnes 
Counties,  the  Sheyenne  River,  now  receiving  flood  waters  from  the 
melting  ice,  was  cutting  its  broad  and  deep  channel  and  building  its 
delta  in  Lake  Agassiz.  With  the  deepening  of  its  channel  the  waters 
from  Lake  Souris  were  diverted  from  their  course  to  the  James,  and 
Lake  Souris  became  connected  with  Lake  Agassiz  by  the  Sheyenne 
River.  The  old  channel  which  formerly  carried  the  waters  of  Lake 
Souris  to  the  James  now  became  a  reversed  waterway.  The  Valley 
of  the  James  is  lower  than  the  former  mouth  of  this  old  channel,  so 
that  the  headwaters  of  the  James  are  not  cut  off  and  drawn  away  by 
the  Sheyenne,  although  in  time  of  high  water  a  sluggish  current  moves 
in  this  channel  toward  the  Sheyenne. 


OTHER    EXTINCT    GLACIAL    LAKES.  115 

When  at  a  later  time  the  ice  had  melted  back  so  that  the  Turtle 
Mountain  plateau  was  uncovered  and  the  lower  land  north  of  these 
mountains  was  freed  from  its  burden  of  ice  and  was  covered  by  the 
waters  of  the  now  larger  Lake  Souris — for  the  lake  grew  larger  as  the 
ice  melted  back — still  another  outlet  lower  than  that  by  the  Big  Coulee 
was  formed  north  and  east  of  the  Turtle  Mountains,  about  twenty 
miles  north  of  the  International  Boundary,  and  the  waters  of  Lake 
Souris  flowed  south  by  the  course  of  Badger  Creek  in  Manitoba, 
through  Lac  des  Roches  in  Towner  County,  and  thence  south  by  the 
Mauvaise  Coulee  into  Devils  Lake.  At  this  time  Devils  Lake  drained 
into  Stump  Lake,  and  Stump  Lake  drained  into  the  Sheyenne  River. 
So  Lake  Souris  still  furnished  water  to  keep  the  Sheyenne  at  flood 
while  it  was  cutting  its  deep  channel  and  building  up  the  great  Shey- 
enne Delta  in  Lake  Agassiz.  On  the  northwest  side  of  the  lake  the 
Assiniboine  River  was  pouring  in  its  waters  and  building  a  delta  upon 
the  bottom  of  Lake  Souris,  and  its  waters  also  were  added  to  the 
volume  of  the  Sheyenne. 

During  the  time  that  Lake  Souris  was  discharging  its  waters  by 
the  Big  Coulee  outlet  into  the  James  River,  and.  later  into  the  Shey- 
enne, and  probably  also  at  the  time  of  the  later  outlet  north  of  the 
Turtle  Mountains  to  Devils  Lake,  another  large  glacial  lake  far  north 
in  Canada,  Lake  Saskatchewan,  was  sending  its  waters  into  Lake 
Souris  also,  so  that  there  was  a  vast  waterway  from  200  miles  north  of 
the  International  Boundary  in  Canada  by  the  way  of  Lake  Souris  and 
the  Sheyenne  to  the  southern  part  of  Lake  Agassiz,  and  from  Lake 
Agassiz  south  by  the  River  Warren  and  the  present  course  of  the 
Minnesota  River  into  the  Mississippi  and  so  to  the  Gulf  of  Mexico. 

At  a  still  later  stage  in  the  melting  of  the  ice  Lake  Souris  was 
drained  by  the  Pembina  River  into  Lake  Agassiz,  and  its  waters  helped 
to  build  up  the  Delta  of  the  Pembina  in  Lake  Agassiz,  and  deepened 
the  channel  of  the  Pembina  River  where  it  crosses  the  crest  of  Pem- 
bina Mountain  to  a  depth  of  350  to  450  feet. 

The  Dakota  Glacier  or  ice-lobe  still  lay  upon  the  northeast  corner 
of  North  Dakota  at  the  time  Lake  Souris  was  drained  by  Lac  des 
Roches  and  the  Mauvaise  Coulee  into  Devils  Lake,  the  southern  end 
of  the  ice-lobe  forming  a  point  which  rested  on  the  highland  west  of 
Park  River,  Conway,  and  Inkster,  and  formed  the  moraine  which  ex- 
tends from  west  of  Inkster  northwest  to  the  northeast  corner  of  Tow- 
ner County.  But  the  ice  had  entirely  melted  off  from  North  Dakota 


116  THE    STORY    OF    THE    PRAIRIES. 

at  the  time  of  the  Pembina  River  outlet.  The  water  of  Lake  Souris 
had  by  this  time  lowered  so  that  the  southern  end  of  the  lake  did  not 
reach  south  of  the  International  Boundary,  and  the  lake  was  finally  en- 
tirely drained  while  the  waters  outflowed  by  this  outlet. 

Thus,  while  Lake  Souris  began  a  long  time  before  Lake  Agassiz, 
Lake  Agassiz  was  still  at  nearly  its  highest  stage  when  Lake  Souris 
was  entirely  drained.  Lake  Souris  began  after  the  ice  had  melted  back 
from  the  position  of  the  First  Moraine  so  that  there  began  to  be  a 
basin  between  the  highland  of  the  Missouri  Plateau  and  the  edge  of  the 
ice-sheet.  The  region  of  the  Red  River  Valley  was  buried  beneath  the 
ice  of  the  Minnesota  Lobe  till  after  the  time  of  forming  of  the  Seventh 
or  Dovre  Moraine.  About  the  time  when  the  Sheyenne  River  began 
to  broaden  out  to  form  the  first  long,  narrow  lake,  which  was  the 
beginning  of  Lake  Agassiz  (page  80),  Lake  Souris  was  changing  to  its 
third  outlet  and  the  waters  of  the  Lake  covered  the  whole  region  of 
the  Ox-Bow  of  the  Mouse  River.  During  all  the  time  that  Lake 
Souris  was  being  drained  into  the  Missouri  River  and  then  by  the  Big 
Coulee  into  the  James  River,  Lake  Agassiz  had  not  yet  begun  to  exist. 
But  the  long  time  that  Lake  Agassiz  continued  while  all  the  beaches 
below  the  Herman  and  Norcross  stages  were  being  formed  makes  it  much 
older  in  length  of  time  of  existence. 

By  reference  to  the  Map  (Figure  i),  it  will  be  seen  that  the  shore- 
line of  Lake  Souris  crosses  the  International  Boundary  near  the  north- 
west corner  of  Bottineau  County,  extending  south  to  the  city  of  Minot. 
thence  follows  nearly  parallel  with  the  Ox-Bow  of  the  Mouse  River  to 
Rugby,  thence  north  to  the  Turtle  Mountains,  and  skirts  the  base  of 
these  mountains  around  their  south,  west  and  north  sides,  and  then 
extends  north  for  forty  miles,  making  the  area  in  Manitoba  about  the 
same  as  that  in  North  Dakota,  and  this  is  just  about  the  same  as  the 
area  covered  by  Lake  Agassiz  in  North  Dakota, 

It  will  thus  be  seen  that  all  the  great  expanse  of  prairie  from  Rugby, 
Willow  City  and  Bottineau  west  and  south  to  Towner,  Velva  and 
Minot,  and  north  to  the  International  Boundary,  is  lake  bottom.  This 
vast  region  embraces  a  natural  basin  of  nearly  4,000,000  acres  within 
the  State  of  North  Dakota  and  an  area  of  about  equal  extent  in  Canada. 
When  the  Great  Ice-Sheet  covered  the  continent  this  great  basin  and 
the  surrounding  highlands  were  filled  and  covered  by  the  ice.  It  was 
the  melting  of  this  enormous  mass  of  ice  which  furnished  the  water 
which,  hemmed  in  by  the  higher  lands  on  three  sides  and  by  the  ice  on 


OTHER  EXTINCT   GLACIAL   LAKES.  117 

the  fourth  or  north  side,  caused  the  lake.  When,  therefore,  the  ice  of 
the  great  glacier  had  melted  back  farther  north  than  where  Velva  now 
stands  a  lake  began  to  be  formed,  growing  larger  as  the  ice  continued 
to  melt  away  toward  the  north.  There  was  at  this  time,  of  course,  no 
Mouse  River,  because  the  land  which  it  now  drains  was  buried  under 
ice  probably  half  a  mile  deep. 

Just  how  long  it  took  for  the  ice  to  melt  away,  and  therefore  how 
long  the  lake  lasted  we  do  not  know,  but  it  was  a  long  time  measured 
in  years,  perhaps  several  centuries,  for  the  outlet  channels  were  cut 
down  a  good  way  into  the  land  surface,  and  the  shore  marks  made  by 
the  washing  of  the  waves  indicate  that  the  water  stood  here  for  a  long- 
time. 

It  will  be  noticed  upon  the  Map  (Figure  i)  that  the  moraines  stop 
at  the  edge  of  the  lake.  The  ice  left  these  earth  materials  upon  the 
lake  bottom  as  well  as  upon  the  land  outside  the  lake.  But  the  waves 
and  currents  of  the  lake  leveled  down  the  hills  to  a.  large  extent  and 
spread  the  materials  upon  the  bottom.  The  lands  are  not  perfectly 
level  on  the  old  lake  bottom  just  west  of  these  hills,  buf  are  quite  roll- 
ing, or  undulating.  They  have  been  leveled  a  good  deal  so  that  the 
rough  and  high  places  have  been  softened  and  toned  down,  giving  a 
gracefully  curved  contour  to  the  surface.  One  can  trace  the  line  of 
hills  of  a  moraine  across  the  lake  bottom  in  many  places  by  the  rolling 
and  undulating  character  of  the  land  surface.  The  lake  bottom  hills 
have  low-rounded,  smooth  surfaces  quite  different  from  the  rugged  and 
irregular  heaps  and  ridges  of  clay,  sand  and  boulders  which  make  up 
the  moraines  east  of  the  lake  shore. 

Since  the  waters  of  the  lake  have  gone  the  old  bottom  has  become 
a  :grassy  prairie.  Boulders  are  scattered  upon  its  surface  as  they  were 
left  by  the  melting  ice  of  the  glacier,  or  were  dropped  from  floating 
cakes  of  ice  formed  on  the  surface  of  the  lake  during  winters  and  so 
scattered  over  the  prairie. 

The  hills  on  the  lake  bottom  are  often  quite  sandy,  and  dune  tracts 
are  common.  The  sand  comes  from  the  Turtle  Mountains  and  the 
region  south,  for  the  ice-sheet  in  crossing  the  Turtle  Mountain  plateau 
combed  off  great  quantities  of  the  soft  sandstone  rock  which  makes  up 
a  large  part  of  the  rock  layers  of  these  mountains.  The  underlying 
rock  south  of  the  mountains  is  sandstone  also,  so  that  as  the  ice 
ploughed  over  the  landscape,  sandstone  rock  was  broken  loose  and 
ground  up,  and  so  when  the  ice  melted  it  left  the  sand  in  morainic 


118 


THE    STORY    OF    THE    PRAIRIES. 


heaps.  The  waves  and  currents  of  the  lake  washed  away  much  of 
whatever  clay  and  earth  was  carried  by  the  ice.  The  clean,  almost 
white,  sancl  was  therefore  left.  The  "heavier"  soils  became  covered 
with  grass  and  other  vegetation,  and  the  sod  so  formed  prevents  the 
wind  from  carrying  the  particles.  The  sand  does  not  readily  become 
sodded  over  and  so  it  is  taken  up  by  the  wind  and  blown  and  piled 
into  dunes. 

Some  large  dune  tracts  are  crossed  by  the  Great  Northern  Railway 


FIG.  60.     Sand  Dunes,  North  of  Towner,  McHenr>  County.     The  Sand  is  Carried  by  the  Wind  over 
the  Crest  of  the  Hills,  and  is  Burying  the  Forest.     Photograph  by  F.  N.  Molyneitx. 

where  it  passes  over  the  old  lake  bottom  from  Rugby  to  Minot.     A 
scant  growth  of  scrubby  timber  holds  a  footing  on  many  of  the  dunes. 
Some  of  these  hills  are  made  up  of  almost  perfectly  clean  whitish  sand 
and  they  are  moved  across  the  country  in  drifts  in  the  same  manner  as 
drifting  snow  travels  with  the  winds. 

During  "the  time  that  the  Antelope  Hills  were  being  formed  at  the 
edge  of  the  ice  Lake  Souris  still  discharged  by  the  Spring  Creek  outlet 
to  the  south,  and  to  the  Missouri  River.  If  the  lines  of  the  moraines 
shown  on  the  Map  are  extended  across  the  lake  bottom  to  show  where 
the  edge  of  the  ice  was  across  the  lake  it  will  be  seen  that  the  lake  was 


OTHER   EXTINCT    GLACIAL    LAKES.  119 

as  yet  only  a  small  sheet,  for  these  lines  mark  the  position  of  the  ice- 
shore  on  the  north  side  of  the  lake.  It  was,  however,  supplied  with 
water  by  the  Des  Lacs  and  Mouse  River  drainage  from  along  the  edge 
of  the  ice-sheet  far  to  the  northwest.  The  outlet  and  shores  were  high 
at  this  time,  and  it  seems  likely  that  the  well  marked  ridge  which  ex- 
tends about  fourteen  miles  from  south  of  Balfour  north  and  west  to 
Pendroy  at  the  Mouse  River  is  a  beach  ridge  formed  on  the  east  side 
of  a  bay  which  formed  the  southern  end  of  the  lake,  and  which  ex- 
tended south  until  the  waters  broke  over  the  summit  near  Balfour. 
This  ridge,  the  famous  "Balfour  Ridge,"  is  as  smooth  and  well-defined 
as  a  railroad  grading,  becoming  higher  and  broader  toward  the  north. 
It  rises  six  to  eight  feet  above  the  prairie  at  the  south  end  about  Bal- 
four and  rises  gradually  and  evenly  till  at  the  north  end,  where  it  is 
abruptly  cut  off  by  the  Mouse  River,  it  is  thirty  feet  high.  Such  a 
beach  would  be  built  higher  where  the  lake  was  wider  and  the  waves 
rolled  higher,  and  this  accords  with  the  form  of  this  southern  bay, 
which  had  its  narrow  point  ten  to  fifteen  miles  south  of  Velva,  near 
Balfour. 

That  this  shore,  and  the  southern  Balfour  or  Spring  Creek  outlet, 
were  higher  than  the  Big  Coulee  outlet,  which  was  opened  after  the 
Antelope  Hills  had  been  formed,  or  which  likely  began  to  be  cut  while 
the  last  ridges  of  these  hills  were  being  formed,  is  shown  by  the  fact 
that  Wintering  Creek  flows  from  along  the  east  side  of  the  Balfour 
Ridge  toward  the  Big  Coulee  outlet,  several  small  coulees  which  enter 
it  flowing  in  deep  cuts  across  the  ridge. 

Glacial  Lake  Dakota.— North  Dakota  has  a  "majority"  in  the  number 
of  old  lake  bottoms  within  the  limits  of  the  State.  Besides  Lake  Agas- 
siz  and  Lake  Souris.  a  third  lake,  which  lay  mostly  in  South  Dakota, 
extended  over  a  small  area  in  Dickey  County  in  North  Dakota.  This 
old  lake  has  been  called  Lake  Dakota.  Like  the  other  two  large 
glacial  lakes  which  have  been  described,  it  \vas  caused  by  the  flood 
waters  from  the  melting  ice-sheet,  but  not  in  just  the  same  way  as 
were  these. 

Lake  Dakota  was  formed  when  the  edge  of  the  ice  on  the  western 
side  of  the  Dakota  Glacier  stood  at  the  position  of  the  Third  or  Ante- 
lope Moraine,  when  the  Valley  of  the  James  River  had  but  just  been 
uncovered  from  the  ice.  The  lake  lay  in  the  Valley  of  the  James  River. 
It  \vas  an  enlargement  on  a  very  large  scale  of  the  James  River.  The 
waters  could  not  escape  at  the  south  fast  enough,  being  dammed  by  a 


120  THE    STORY    OF    THE    PRAIRIES. 

ridge  of  hard  rock,  the  Sioux  Quartzite,  the  rock  which  is  spoken  of 
in  Chapter  Two  as  being  at  the  surface  in  central  eastern  South  Dakota. 
This  rock  is  very  hard,  and  the  ice-sheet  in  passing  over  it  did  not  plane 
it  off  as  it  did  the  softer  rocks  to  the  north.  The  result  was  that  a 
ridge  or  low  hill  of  this  rock  lay  across  the  course  of  the  James  River 
and  acted  as  a  dam,  causing  the  waters  to  accumulate  and  spread  out 
north  of  it,  thus  forming  the  lake.  The  edge  of  the  ice-sheet  lay  along 
the  east  side  of  the  James  Valley  and  so  there  was  much  water  flowing 
down  its  course  from  the  melting  of  the  ice. 

The  ridge  of  hard  quartzite  was  at  Alexandria,  South  Dakota,  and 
the  lake  extended  north  from  here  along  the  present  Valley  of  the 
James  River  to  Oakes  in  North  Dakota.  Its  length  was  about  175 
miles,  and  it  varied  in  width  from  eight  or  ten  to  thirty  miles,  and  its 
depth  in  the  deepest  part  was  probably  175  feet. 

Only  the  northern  end  of  this  lake  extended  into  North  Dakota. 
Where  the  southern  boundary  line  of  the  State  crosses  the  old  lake 
bottom  it  is  about  eight  miles  in  width.  It  extends  a  few  miles  north 
of  Oakes  in  North  Dakota,  and  covers  a  territory  in  this  State  of  a  little 
more  than  100  square  miles. 

Glacial  "Lake  Sargent."— In  the  interval  after  the  draining  away  of 
Lake  Dakota  and  before  the  beginning  of  Lake  Agassiz,  a  glacial  lake 
covered  the  greater  part  of  Sargent  County,  a  small  part  of  Ransom 
County,  and  extended  about  ten  miles  into  Marshall  County,  South 
Dakota.  No  name  having  been  given  to  this  extinct  lake,  it  is  here 
called  "Lake  Sargent." 

The  broad  morainic  belt  on  the  western  line  of  Sargent  and  Ran- 
som Counties  served  as  the  western  shore  of  this  lake,  this  moraine 
and  the  Coteau  des  Prairies  the  southern  "  shore,  and  the  wall  of  the 
melting  ice-sheet  the  northern  and  eastern  shore.  As  the  ice  melted 
on  the  eastern  side  of  this  moraine  adding  its  waters  to  those  of  the 
lake  the  area  of  the  lake  extended  eastward  following  the  melting  ice, 
till  the  Dovre  Moraine  was  formed.  This  moraine  became  the  eastern 
shore  and  was  washed  on  its  western  side  by  the  waves  of  the  lake. 
The  shore-line  thus  extended  from  Nicholson  and  Straubville  south 
across  the  State  Line  to  Burch,  South  Dakota,  then  north  and  east 
around  the  head  of  the  Coteau  des  Prairies  to  Lake  Tewaukon  or 
Skunk  Lake,  and  north  by  Cayuga  and  Ransom,  covering  the  Stormy 
Lakes,  and  extending  north  into  Ransom  County,  its  area  covering 
probably  between  600  and  700  square  miles. 


OTHER   EXTINCT   GLACIAL   LAKES.  121 

Lake  Dakota  had  been  drained  away  before  the  beginning  of  Lake 
Sargent,  and  the  James  River  was  flowing  across  its  old  bed.  Lake 
Sargent  at  first  discharged  to  the  southwest  across  the  now  dry  bottom 
of  Lake  Dakota  into  the  James  River.  Later  when  Lake  Agassiz  had 
begun  to  be  formed  a  lower  channel  of  discharge  probably  was  found 
to  the  east  from  Lake  Tewaukon  close  north  of  the  Coteau  des  Prairies 
highland  and  south  of  the  high  range  of  hills  (Dovre  Moraine)  which 
extends  south  of  Lidgerwood,  passing  through  a  low  place  in  the  mo- 
raine, and  entering  Lake  Agassiz  about  four  miles  south  of  Hankin- 
son,  and  twenty  miles  east  of  Lake  Tewaukon. 

The  depth  of  the  lake  at  the  time  of  its  highest  stage  was  probably 
about  50  feet  at  Forman,  100  feet  at  Perry  and  150  feet  along  the 
northeast  side  in  the  vicinity  of  the  Stormy  Lakes,  though  the  eastern 
outlet  may  have  lowered  the  water  before  it  became  as  deep  as  these 
figures  indicate. 

The  eastern  two-thirds  of  Sargent  County  is  now  drained  into  the 
Red  River  of  the  North  by  the  Wild  Rice,  which  enters  the  area  of 
^Lake  Agassiz  near  Wyndmere.  A  cut  of  twenty-five  feet  in  the  mo- 
raine east  of  the  James  River  twelve  miles  south  of  the  State  Line  at 
Amherst,  South  Dakota,  would  permit  the  waters  of  the  James  River 
to  be  carried  by  the  course  of  the  Wild  Rice  to  the  Red  River  of  the 
North.  The  elevation  at  Amherst  is  1,312  feet  above  sea-level.  Wild 
Rice  station,  near  the  mouth  of  the  Wild  Rice  River,  where  it  enters 
the  Red  is  911  feet  above  sea-level,  so  that  there  would  be  a  fall  of 
about  400  feet  from  the  James  River  to  the  Red  River  of  the  North  in 
a  distance  of  about  100  miles,  a  fall  about  four  and  one-half  times  as 
great  as  that  of  the  Red  River  from  Lake  Traverse  to  Lake  Winnipeg. 
Had  it  not  been  that  the  James  River  cut  a  channel  deep  enough  to 
prevent  it  breaking  over  to  the  east  while  the  ice-sheet  still  covered 
the  land  to  the  east  and  was  forming  the  large  moraine  which  lies  east 
of  the  Valley  of  the  James,  that  river  might  have  taken  an  easterly 
course  to  the  Red  River  of  the  North  instead  of  its  present  southerly 
course.  This  is  an  interesting  example  of  the  way  the  ice-sheet 
changed  and  directed  the  course  of  rivers. 

At  Nicholson  a  broad  channel  widens  out  onto  this  old  lake  bottom, 
a  channel  by  which  a  large  glacial  river  entered  this  old  lake.  This 
old  channel  was  occupied  by  the  Sheyenne  River  before  the  ice-sheet 
had  melted  back  far  enough  to  allow  this  river  to  cut  its  present  chan- 
nel south  of  Valley  City  to  Lisbon.  It  is  about  two  and  a  half  miles 


122  THE   STORY    OF   THE    PRAIRIES. 

wide  where  it  is  crossed  by  the  Fargo  Southwestern  Branch  of  the 
Northern  Pacific  Railway  at  Englevale.  It  extends  north  into  the  Fort 
Ransom  Military  Reservation,  and  south  at  Nicholson  broadens  out 
onto  the  bottom  of  Lake  Sargent.  Ridges  of  drift  formed  islands  in  the 
broad  river,  and  deep  channels  cut  in  its  flat  bottom  perhaps  by  cur- 
rents of  the  old  river  during  winters  when  the  melting  of  the  ice-sheet 
was  less  rapid,  are  now  filled  with  water  and  give  to  the  old  valley  the 
name  of  Big  Slough. 

The  Sheyenne  River  received  water  from  all  along  the  edge  of  the 
ice-sheet  north  to  Devils  Lake,  and  probably  during  this  time  received 
the  waters  from  Lake  Souris  by  the  way  of  the  Big  Coulee  outlet.  It 
did  not,  however,  cut  a  channel  so  deep  but  that,  when  the  ice  had 
melted  back  farther  than  to  the  position  of  the  Dovre  Moraine  and 
the  course  of  its  present  valley  was  uncovered  and  Lake  Agassiz  began 
to  be  formed,  it  cut  its  deep  channel  south  and  east  to  Lisbon  and 
began  to  build  up  its  delta  at  Milnor. 

When,  therefore,  Lake  Sargent  had  been  lowered  by  the  opening  of 
its  eastern  outlet  from  Lake  Tewaukon  to  the  east  into  Lake  Agassiz 
and  the  Sheyenne  River  had  ceased  to  pour  its  waters  into  Lake  Sar- 
gent this  lake  rapidly  ceased  to  be,  and  later  still  the  drainage  from 
the  Lake  Sargent  area  was  established  by  the  course  of  the  present 
Wild  Rice  River.  So  Lake  Sargent  came  into  existence  after  the 
formation  of  the  large  moraine  which  consists  of  the  combined  Fourth, 
Fifth  and  Sixth  Moraines  along  the  western  boundaries  of  Ransom  and 
Sargent  Counties,  and  continued  to  grow  larger  during  the  time  that 
the  ice  was  melting  back  to  the  position  of  the  Seventh  or  Dovre  Mo- 
raine, after  which  it  quickly  disappeared  by  the  drawing  off  of  its  waters 
to  the  east  and  by  the  changing  of  the  course  of  the  Sheyenne  River 
so  that  its  waters  did  not  enter  this  lake.  Lake  Dakota  began  at  or 
before  the  time  of  depositing  of  the  Fourth  Moraine  and  had  disap- 
peared before  the  beginning  of  Lake  Sargent  at  the  time  of  the  Sixth 
Moraine.  Lake  Agassiz  began  with  the  same  events  which  caused  the 
closing  of  the  existence  of  Lake  Sargent,  that  is,  the  withdrawing  by 
melting  of  the  edge  of  the  ice-sheet  farther  east  than  the  Dovre 
Moraine  so  that  the  basin  of  the  Red  River  of  the  North  began  to  be 
uncovered,  and  the  withdrawing  of  the  waters  of  the  Sheyenne  River 
from  Lake  Sargent  to  that  basin  and  at  the  same  time  causing  the 
drawing  aw7ay  of  the  waters  of  Lake  Sargent. 


CHAPTER    THE    ELEVENTH. 
THE   HISTORY  OF   DEVILS  LAKE. 

The  history  of  Devils  Lake  is  interesting  not  only  because  it  is  "The 
Great  Salt  Lake"  of  North  Dakota  and  the  largest  lake  in  the  State,  but 
its  history  forms  an  interesting  chapter  in  the  geology  of  the  State. 

The  Cause  of  the  Lake. — A  line  connecting  Stump  Lake  and  Devils 
Lake  and  extending  northwest  through  Ibsen,  Hurricane,  Grass,  Island 
and  Long  Lakes  probably  marks  the  place  of  an  old  river  valley  which 
once  extended  from  near  the  Turtle  Mountains  to  the  Red  River.  This 
old  valley  was  filled  or  nearly  filled  with  drift.  The  Blue  Hills  south- 
west of  Stump  and  southeast  of  Devils  Lake,  the  high  and  massive  hills 
south  of  Devils  Lake,  Mauvais  Butte,  or  Big  Butte,  south  of  Lake 
Ibsen,  the  eastern  end  of  which  is  about  eight  miles  west  of  the  western 
end  of  Devils  Lake,  a  hill  about  ten  miles  long,  and  the  high  land 
northwest  from  Mauvais  Butte  which  forms  the  watershed  or  divide 
between  the  Mouse  Valley  and  Mauvaise  Coulee,  which  is  the  highest 
point  crossed  by  the  Great  Northern  Railway  between  Grand  Forks 
and  the  Missouri  Plateau  west  of  Minot,  form  a  series  of  highlands 
which  were  probably  the  southern  and  western  side  of  this  valley. 
This  it  will  be  understood  was  a  valley  upon  the  landscape  of  "Old 
North  Dakota,"  or  the  pre-glacial  landscape. 

When  the  ice-sheet  melted  off  from  the  land  the  valley  was  nearly 
filled  with  drift.  It  was  not  entirely  filled  for  its  course  is  still  able  to 
be  traced  for  100  miles  from  the  east  end  of  Stump  Lake  to*  Long  Lake 
south  of  the  Turtle  Mountains.  All  these  lakes  lie  lengthwise  of  this 
valley  as  we  should  expect  them  to  do  if  this  were  the  partially  filled 
valley  of  an  old  river. 

The  Blue  Hills  are  veneered  hills,  that  is,  hills  which  were  there 
before  the  ice-sheet  came,  and  which  have  been  covered  with  a  mantle 
of  drift.  So  also  the  high  hills  south  of  Devils  Lake  were  hills  before 
the  ice  melted  in  trying  to  cross  over  them  and  dumped  the  drift  hills 
on  top  of  them.  Mauvais  or  Big  Butte  is  also  covered  with  a  mantle  or 
coating  of  drift,  but  is  not  itself  made  up  of  drift. 

123 


124  THE    STORY    OF   THE    PRAIRIES. 

The  Blue  Hills,  which  rise  from  100  to  200  feet  above  Stump  Lake, 
the  massive  hills  south  of  Devils  Lake,  the  highest  of  which,  Devils 
Heart  and  Sully's  Hill,  rise  275  to  290  feet  above  the  water  of  Devils 
Lake,  and  Mauvais  Butte,  which  rises  at  its  higher  western  end  nearly 
300  feet  above  the  prairie  at  its  base,  are  all  elevated  masses  of  Cretace- 
ous (Fort  Pierre)  shale,  their  rough  surfaces  having  been  combed  off 
and  smoothed  by  the  ice-sheet  passing  over  them,  and  leaving  a  cover- 
ing of  drift  as  it  melted. 

Devils  Lake  and  Stump  Lake  occupy  deep  hollows  in  this  old  val- 
ley where  it  was  less  filled  with  drift.  Stump  Lake  is  said  to  be  nearly 
100  feet  deep  in  its  deepest  place,  and  Devils  Lake  in  the  centre  of  the 
widest  portion  of  the  eastern  end  is  75  to  80  feet  deep.  The  drift  on  the 
surrounding  prairies  is  from  10  to  50  feet  deep  on  the  general  land- 
scape and  as  much  as  100  feet  deep  in  the  morainic  hills.  These  lakes 
thus  lie  in  a  trough  in  the  rocks  which  underlie  the  drift  materials. 
They  are,  in  fact,  lakes  formed  by  the  damming  of  a  river  valley.  At 
least  it  seems  probable  that  they  lie  in  such  a  valley.  Some  of  the  arms 
or  bays  of  Devils  Lake  are  very  likely  the  partially  filled  valleys  which 
were  'tributary  to  the  main  valley.  Some  of  the  bays  are  caused  by 
moraines  which  were  dumped  into  the  valley  and  now  form  the  bluffs 
on  the  north  side  of  the  lake,  but  it  does  not  seem  that  these  gave  the. 
general  form  to  the  outline  of  the  lake.  The  sides  or  shores  on  the 
south  side  seem  to  be  the  underlying  rock  only  thinly  covered  with 
drift. 

Devils  and  Stump  Lakes  were  much  larger  bodies  of  water  during 
the  time  when  the  ice-sheet  was  melting  north  of  these  lakes  and  a  flood 
of  ice-waters  was  being  poured  into  them.  There  are  marks  made  by 
the  waves  twenty-one  to  twenty-five  feet  higher  than  the  present  sur- 
face of  low-water  in  these  lakes.  If  the  water  in  Devils  Lake  should 
rise  sixteen  feet  above  low-water  a  connection  would  be  made  across 
from  its  eastern  end  near  Jerusalem  to  Stump  Lake,  and  if  it  should 
rise  five. to  eight  feet  higher  still,  Stump  Lake  would  also  drain  into 
the  Sheyenne  River.  An  old  channel  connects  Stump  Lake  with  the 
valley  of  the  Sheyenne,  as  also  a  lower  channel  which  connects  Devils 
and  Stump  Lakes,  showing  that  there  has  in  time  past  been  an  outflow 
to  the  Sheyenne  as  well  as  connection  between  the  two  lakes. 

If  we  follow  the  Chain-of-Lakes  and  the  Mauvaise  Coulee  to  Lac 
des  Roches  near  the  international  boundary,  and  thence  by  Badger 
Creek  to  Pelican  Lake  in  Manitoba,  and  to  the  Souris  River,  a  natural 


THE   HISTORY   OF   DEVILS    LAKE.  125 

waterway  is  seen  to  almost  connect  the  Souris  with  Devils  Lake.  This 
was  the  course  of  the  outlet  of  Lake  Souris  to  Devils  Lake  and  the 
Sheyenne  River  before  the  ice-sheet  had  melted  off  from  the  northeast 
corner  of  North  Dakota. 

At  the  time  the  waters  of  Lake  Souris  flowed  by  this  course,  Sweet- 
water,  Dry,  and  De  Groat  Lakes,  which  are  fenced  in  by  the  terminal 
moraine  which  lies  south  of  them,  were  higher  than  now  because  of  the 
flood  of  ice-water  they  received  from  the  melting  ice-sheet,  the  edge 
of  which  was  but  a  little  north  of  them  at  this  time,  and  flowed  across 
to>  the  south  into  Devils  Lake. 

Fluctuations  of  Level. — The  waters  of  all  lakes  vary  in  the  height 
of  their  water-level  during  periods  of  years.  Devils  Lake  has  been 
much  higher  than  it  is  now,  as  is  shown  by  beach-lines  marked  by  the 
waves  at  levels  considerably  higher  than  the  present  high-water  level. 
It  has  also  been  much  lower  than  the  present  low-water,  as  is  shown  by 
forests  which  are  now  submerged  along  the  shores  below  low-water. 
Such  trees  now  stand  with  their  roots  imbedded  in  the  mud  in  Stump 
Lake,  and  also  in  the  Washington  Lakes  a  few  miles  south  of  Devils 
Lake  in  Eddy  county.  It  is  said  that  the  name  Stump  Lake  came  from 
this  fact. 

The  year  1889  marks  a  low  stage  in  the  waters  of  Devils  and  Stump 
Lakes,  while  about  sixty  years  before,  in  1830,  the  waters  of  these  lakes 
were  sixteen  feet  higher  than  in  1889.  This  was  about  the  time  of 
the  highest  known  flood  of  the  Red  River  of  the  North,  when  its  wa- 
ters rose  so  high  that  they  covered  the  land  on  which  the  City  of  Win- 
nipeg stands  to  a  depth  of-  five  feet.  The  waters  of  Devils  Lake  rise 
and  fall  through  a  height  of  four  feet  in  a  dozen  years.  Since  Fort 
Totten  was  built,  about  thirty-five  years  ago,  the  lake  has  fallen  ten 
feet.  At  the  time  of  the  high  water  in  1830  the  height  of  the  water 
in  Devils  Lake  was  limited  by  an  overflow  into  Stump  Lake,  a  channel 
about  sixteen  feet  above  low-water,  as  has  been  stated,  connecting  the 
two  lakes.  It  is  likely  it  has  risen  high  enough  to  discharge  into 
Stump  Lake  many  times  in  the  period  since  the  Ice  Age. 

At  the  time  the  melting  ice-sheet  was  pouring  its  waters  into  these 
lakes  their  level  was  twenty-one  to  twenty-five  feef  higher  than  the 
low  stage  in  1889,  and  Stump  Lake  then  discharged  into  the  Sheyenne 
River.  The  channel  from  Stump  Lake  to  the  Sheyenne  has  a  nearly 
flat  bottom  150  feet  wide,  and  hills  rise  on  either  side  fifty  to  seventy- 
five  feet  high.  The  bottom  of  this  old  channel  is  higher  than  the 


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126 


128  THE   STORY    OF   THE    PRAIRIES. 

beaches  which  were  formed  by  the  waves  during  the  probably  quite 
long  time  when  the  waters  were  at  the  high  stage  of  1830,  which  are 
sixteen  feet  higher  than  the  low  stage  of  1889,  but  these  beaches  are 
higher  than  the  bottom  of  the  channel  connecting  the  east  end  of 
Devils  Lake  at  Jerusalem  with  the  west  end  of  Stump  Lake,  and  these 
beaches  are  marked  on  the  sides  of  this  channel  showing  that  the  two 
lakes  were  then  united  or  joined  by  a  strait. 

The  heavy  and  older  forests  which  border  these  lakes  extend  across 
the  highest  shore-line  which  marks  the  height  of  the  waters  at  the  time 
of  the  melting  away  of  the  ice-sheet,  and  down  to  the  beach  which 
marks  the  high  stage  of  1830.  Below  this  shore-line  are  only  smaller 
and  scattering  trees,  one  of  the  largest  of  which  is  reported  to  have 
been  cut  by  Captain  Heerman  and  to  .-have  had  fifty-seven  annual  rings 
of  growth.  During  the  igth  century,  therefore,  these  lakes  probably 
have  not  stood  above  the  high  shore-line  of  1830.  The  old  submerged 
forests  may  date  back  200  years  earlier  to  the  time  of  the  great  period 
of  drought  when  Pyramid  and  Winnemucca  Lakes  in  the  Great  Basin 
of  Nevada  were  dried  up. 


NORTH    DAKOTA 
Tower  Sheet 


T.140V. 


T.  139N. 


T.  138H. 


T.137N. 


T.  138N. 


51 =  T  136N, 


FIG.  63.    The  Tower  Quadrangle. 
129 


CHAPTER  THE  TWELFTH. 
THE  SHEYENNE  RIVER. 

The  Sheyenne  River  is  one  of  the  most  interesting  of  rivers.  Some- 
thing of  its  history  has  been  given  in  the  earlier  pages  of  this  book. 
A  brief  statement  of  a  few  important  facts,  as  illustrating  the  effect  of 
the  great  ice  sheet  in  determining  the  courses  of  modern  streams,  is 
given  here,  though  at  the  risk  of  repetition.  Only  the  portion  of  the 
River  between  Valley  City  and  Lisbon  is  considered. 

An  Example  of  a  Glacial  Valley. — The  casual  observer  who  has 
but  little  knowledge  of  geology  cannot  but  be  impressed  with  the  very 
great  size  of  the  Sheyenne  Valley  when  viewed  in  comparison  with  the 
very  small  modern  stream  that  occupies  it.  The  valley  that  has  been 
excavated  by  the  waters  that  have  passed  down  this  course  is  as  much 
as  5  miles  in  width  at  Valley  City,  and  the  depth  of  the  valley  below 
its  highest  floodplain  (now  known  as  a  terrace)  is  as  much  as  200  feet. 
The  great  valley  is  marked  by  terraces,  often  broad,  which  are  remnants 
of  the  floodplains  of  the  river  when  it  flowed  at  much  higher  levels  than 
any  reached  by  the  modern  stream.  These  floodplains  were  left  high 
above  the  river  as  it  eroded  its  channel  deeper. 

The  Lanona  Plain. — The  highest  floodplain  of  the  river  is  known 
as  the  Lanona  plain.  This  plain  is  nearly  200  feet  higher  than  the  bot- 
tom lands  of  the  present  site  of  Valley  City.  When  the  river  flowed 
at  this  stage,  and  before  the  present  deep  valley  had  been  eroded,  it  was 
a  stream  5  miles  in  width  in  the  vicinity  of  Valley  City.  The  waters 
that  kept  this  tremendous  stream  at  flood  tide  came  from  the  melting  of 
the  great  ice  sheet.  At  this  time  Devils  Lake  and  Stump  Lake  were 
much  larger  bodies  of  water  than  now,  and  these  were  joined  by  a  con- 
necting channel  so  that  the  waters  of  Devils  Lake  passed  to  Stump 
Lake,  and  the  waters  in  turn  passed  from  Stump  Lake  to  the  Sheyenne. 
Devils  Lake  was  at  this  time  a  body  of  fresh  water  and  not  a  salt  lake 
as  now. 

The  waters  of  this  great  stream  were  not  at  this  time  discharged  in- 
to the  Red  River  .of  the  North,  for  there  was  as  yet  no  Red  River  of  the 


131 


II 


THE    SHEYENNE    RIVER.  133 

North,  neither  was  there  yet  any  Glacial  Lake  Agassiz  occupying  the 
Red  River  Valley.  On  the  other  hand  the  Red  River  Valley  was  filled 
and  covered  with  the  ice  of  the  great  ice  sheet,  and  the  Sheyenne  at  this 
time  discharged  to  the  south  instead  of  turning  east,  as  at  present,  at 
Fort  Ransom,  its  waters  being  mingled  with  those  of  the  James  and 
thence  passing  to  the  Missouri. 

At  this  time. the  edge  of  the  great  ice  sheet  probably  lay  upon  the 
Alta  Ridge,  and  southward  to  Standing  Rock  in  Preston  township,  the 
ice  covering  the  whole  course  of  the  present  river  below  Fort  Ransom. 
Bears  Den  Hillock,  immediately  west  of  Fort  Ransom,  and  the  range 
of  morainic  hills  that  runs  southward  from  this  large  morainic  hill 


FIG.  67.    Section  of  Sheyenne  Valley  at  Valley  City. 

Generalized  section  from  the  butte  east  of  city  northwest  about  zl/z  miles,  through 
sections  22,  21,  16,  17,  Valley  township. 

through  the  townships  of  range  58  to  and  beyond  the  southern  boundary 
of  the  state  of  North  Dakota,  represent  the  deposits  made  at  the  edge 
of  the  ice  at  this  time. 

It  will  be  easily  seen  therefore  that  the  Sheyenne  River  could  not 
have  followed  its  present  course  east  of  Fort  Ransom,  as  this  whole 
region  was  buried  underneath  the  ice.  But  it  has  been  stated  that  the 
river  at  this  time  was  probably  5  miles  in  width  in  the  neighborhood  of 
Valley  City.  Where,  then,  was  the  river  20  miles  south? 

The  Sand  Prairie  Spillway. — The  nearly  level  Lanona  plain  ex- 
tends south  of  Valley  City  about  8  miles,  bordering  the  moraine  on  Al- 
ta Ridge,  the  Fergus  Falls  moraine.  Southward  from  here  the  moraine 
lies  close  upon  the  east  bank  of  Sheyenne  Valley.  Standing  Rock  and 
Bears  Den  Hillock  are  regarded  as  belonging  to  this  moraine,  and  it 
has  been  stated  that  the  moraine  extends  many  miles  to  the  south. 
Evidently  then  the  earliest  Sheyenne  River  was  compelled  to  discharge 


134 


THE    STORY    OF    THE    PRAIRIES. 


to  the  south  instead  of  turning  to  the  east  at  Fort  Ransom,  as  now. 
At  this  time  the  moraine  extended  across  where  is  now  the  deep  valley 
between  Standing  Rock  and  Bears  Den  Hillock.  The  edge  of  the 


~i — 

t  e  _      —  -.  -     '  • —  _zi 


FIG.  68.    Section  of  Sheyenne  Valley,  3^4  Miles  South  of  Valley  City. 

great  ice  sheet  and  the  moraine  which  had  been  deposited  together 
formed  a  great  dam  against  which  the  waters  could  not  prevail.  The 
waters  therefore  gathered  along  the  edge  of  the  ice  till  they  covered 
a  broad  tract  of  land,  and  finally  when  compelled  to  go  somewhere  they 
flowed  south  on  the  west  side  of*this  moraine,  and  entered  Lake  Dako- 
ta and  the  James  River.  This  broad  tract  where  the  waters  ponded  is 
now  known  as  Sand  Prairie.  It  was  a  sort  of  spillway  or  lake  caused 
by  this  piling  in  of  the  waters  of  the  great  glacial  river. 


FlG.  69.     Section  of  Sheyenne  Valley,  j  Miles  Below  Valley  City. 

On  the  map.  Figure  64,  a  broad  expanse  of  water  is  represented  west 
of  the  present  site  of  Fort  Ransom.  The  land  here  is  now  an  almost 
level  sandy  plain,  locally  known  as  Sand  Prairie.  For  several  miles 
along  the  west  bank  of  the  Sheyenne  Valley,  in  Bear  Creek  and  Oak- 
ville  townships,  this  level  plain  comes  up  to  the  edge  of  the  valley,  stop- 
ping abruptly  as  though  it  had  been  cut  off.  And  this  is  really  what  has 
happened,  for  this  level  plain  was  once  the  bottom  of  the  Sheyenne 


THE    SHEYENNE    RIVER.  135 

River,  and  the  north  end  of  this  flat  plain  was  eroded  away  as  the 
river  cut  its  valley  deeper. 

The  River  Ransom — The  river  thus  far  described  represents  the 
earliest  stage  of  the  Sheyenne.  After  a  time,  we  do  not  know  how  long, 
the  ice  melted  so  that  the  water  did  not  all  escape  by  the  Sand  Prairie 
spillway  and  southward  by  the  course  west  of  this  moraine,  but  formed  a 
channel  on  the  east  side  of  the  moraine.  This  means  that  a  passage 
had  to  be  cut  through  the  moraine  that  had  been  formed  during  the 
time  the  river  was  discharging  south  by  the  Sand  Prairie  spillway  and 
Lake  Dakota.  This  gap  or  passage  through  the  moraine  is  now  shown 
by  the  steep  high  morainic  hills  such  as  Standing  Rock  and  Bears  Den 
Hillock,  which  stand  close  upon  the  banks  of  the  valley,  and  by  the  rolling 
hills  in  southern  Bear  Creek  township  which  were  partially  worn  away 
and  leveled  by  the  action  of  the  river.  The  narrow  canyon-like  char- 
acter of  the  valley  from  Standing  Rock  southward  to  Fort  Ransom  also 
shows  that  the  river  had  a  hard  time  cutting  a  channel  through  this  re- 
gion. The  waters  could  not  escape  to  the  eastward,  however,  even  after 
they  had  found  a  way  across  the  moraine,  because  the  ice  had  not  melted 
to  the  eastward  of  Fort  Ransom. 

There  was  formed  at  this  time  a  new  channel  to  the  south  from 
Fort  Ransom,  the  bottom  of  this  channel  being  now  about  80  feet 
lower  than  the  earlier  channel  rep-resented  by  Sand  Prairie.  The 
stream  that  eroded  this  ancient  channel  has  been  called  the  River  Ran- 
som. It  extended  south  from  Fort  Ransom  on  the  east  side  o-f  the  mo- 
raine that  has  been  referred  to  as  extending  to  the  state  line  in  range 
58,  and  between  this  moraine  and  the  ice  front.  This  channel  is  a 
large  broad  ancient  water  course  that  can  be  easily  traced  southward  to 
Englevale  and  beyond,  till  it  finally  broadens  out  into  the  plain  of  the 
ancient  bottom  o>f  Glacial  Lake  Sargent  a  little  south  of  the  northern 

EflST  WS/E3T 


FIG.  70.    Section  of  Sheyenne  Valley,  10  Miles  Below  Valley  City, 


136 


THE    STORY    OF    THE    PRAIRIES 


li 


THE    SHEYENNE    RIVER. 


137 


boundary  line  of  Sargent  County.  The  River  Ransom  was  half  a  mile 
to  2  or  3  miles  in  width.  The  town  of  Englevale  stands  in  the  midst 
of  this  old  river,  or  in  other  words,  the  gravelly  and  sandy  plain  upon 
which  Englevale  is  built  is  the  bottom  O'f  this  old  river.  This  ancient 
bottom  is  called  the  Big  Slough  by  the  people  who  live  in  this  vicinity. 

In  sections  12,  13,  and  24,  Bear  Creek  township,  an  old  channel  lies 
about  thirty  feet  below  the  level  of  Sand  Prairie,  showing  how  much  the 
Sheyenne  River  had  cut  down  its  channel  at  this  time.  This  old  valley 
is  as  perfect  a  ditch  as  could  be  made  with  shovels  and  grading  crew. 
It  is  now  a  dry  channel,  in  part  a  hay  meadow  and  in  part  ploughed 
fields. 

Another  channel  crosses  this  same  terrace  plain  about  a  mile  to 
the  east,  and  is  about  20  feet  lower  than  the  channel  last  described. 


EflST 


WEST 


FIG.  73.    Section  of  Sheyenne  Valley,  13  Miles  Below  Valley  City. 


FIG.  74.    Section  of  Sheyenne  Valley  at  "The  Jaws." 
Section  36,  Bear  Creek  Township,  25  Miles  Below  Valley"  City. 


138 


THE    STORY    OF    THE    PRAIRIES. 


The  broad  terrace  into  which  these  channels  were  eroded  lies  in  a  turn 
or  bend  of  the  valley,  this  terrace  representing"  the  floodplain  of  the 
river  before  the  deeper  valley  had  been  excavated  around  the  bend. 

In  sections  35,  Bear  Creek,  and  2  and  u,  Fort  Ransom  townships, 
terraces  of  an  old  river  bed  can  be  seen  high  up  on  the  steep  side  of  the 


1200 


FlG    75.     Section  of  Sheyenne  Valley  Above  Lisbon. 
The  cut-off  Passes  West  of  Lisbon  about  z  miles. 

present  valley  70  to  80  feet  below  the  level  of  Sand  Prairie,  and  nearly 
200'  feet  above  the  present  bottom  of  the  Sheyenne  Valley.  This  old 
channel  represents  a  later  stage  in  the  development  of  the  valley  than 
the  channels  just  referred  to,  being  considerably  lower,  but  the  waters 
were  discharged  by  the  channel  of  the  River  Ransom  during  all  this 
time.  \t  Fort  Ransom  this  ancient  channel  hangs  on  the  steep  side  of 


FIG.  76.    Railroad  Cut  East  of  Kathryn. 
Shale  shown  at  right,  and  the  Terrace  Floodplain  continuous  with  this  at  left. 


THE    SHEYENNE    RIVER. 


139 


the  valley  186  feet  above  the  water  of  the  river  below.  This  seems  such 
a  big  story  that  it  was  determined  by  leveling,  so  that  no  one  could  say 
it  was  merely  guess-work!  The  bottom  of  this  channel  is  now  a  flat 
shelf  or  terrace,  its  east  side  having  been  eroded  away,  its  west  side 
being  the  great  wall  o>f  the  valley  side.  From  this  shelf  the  leveling 
instrument  was  pointed  southward  dow7n  the  big  channel  of  the  River 
Ransom,  and  this  broad  flat  bottom  was  found  to  be  at  the  same  level 
as  this  shelf. 


FIG.  77.     An  Outlier  of  Shale,  West  Bank  of  Sheyenne  Valley. 

The  flat  top  represents  a  portion  of  an  Old  Floodplain  (terrace)  ;  the  channel  of  the  river 
has  been  eroded  into  the  Lower  Floodplain  (the  lowest  terrace.) 

The  Sheyenne  Valley  East  of  Fort  Ransom — In  course  of  time  the 
great  ice  sheet  grew  less,  and  its  margin  retreated  by  melting  farther 
toward  the  east  and  north.  Finally  the  waters  could  escape  eastward 
near  the  present  site  of  the  city  of  Lisbon,  and  the  old  channel  of  the 
River  Ransom  became  an  abandoned  channel. 

It  was  about  this  time  that  the  Maple  system  of  glacial  channels,  de- 
scribed in  the  next  chapter,  began  to  be  formed.  When  however  the 
first  Maple  River  discharged  its  waters  southward  by  the  channel  of 
the  South  Branch  the  Sheyenne  did  not  follow  its  present  course  by  the 
city  of  Lisbon.  A  large  "cut-off"  channel  crosses  the  bend  about  2 
miles  west  of  Lisbon,  which  is  60  to  80  feet  higher  than  the  bottom 
of  the  present  valley  at  Lisbon,  the  valley  not  having  been  yet  eroded 
to  its  present  depth. 

The  Hanging  Valley  of  the  Maple.— The  channel  of  the  South 
Branch,  which  joins  the  Sheyenne  Valley  about  4  miles  above  Lisbon, 
conveyed  the  waters  of  the  Maple  to  the  Sheyenne  while  the  Sheyenne 


140  THE    STORY    OF    THE    PRAIRIES. 

was  yet  flowing  about  75  feet  above  the  present  valley  bottom.  This 
is  the  reason  that  the  channel  of  the  South  Branch  is  said  to  enter 
the  valley  of  the  Sheyenne  by  a  "hanging"  valley."  The  Sheyenne 
Valley  has  been  eroded  75  feet  deeper  since  the  waters  of  the  Maple 
ceased  to  be  discharged  into  this  valley,  and  so  the  ancient  mouth  of 
of  the  South  Branch  Channel  is  left  hung  up  75  feet  above  the  present 
Sheyenne  Valley  bottom.  This  old  mouth  has  since  been  dissected  by  a 
recent  coulee,  but  still  the  bottom  of  the  ancient  channel  can  be  easily 
seen  high  above  the  Sheyenne  bottom. 

Terraces  of  the  Sheyenne  Valley — The  history  of  the  Sheyenne 
River  is  revealed  by  the  form  of  its  present  valley.  The  high  terraces 
that  mark  its  sides  indicate  the  former  levels  at  which  the  stream  flowed. 
A  terrace  shelf  is  a  part  of  what  at  one  time  was  the  floodplain  of  the 
river.  True  it  is  that  no  man  was  there  to  write  a  record  of  the  size 
of  the  river.  Nevertheless  the  width  of  the  river  is  stated  quite  con- 
fidently to  have  been  as  much  as  5  miles  at  Valley  City,  because  the 
floodplain  of  the  ancient  stream  is  seen  to  extend  to  this  distance.  The 
terrace  called  the  Lanona  plain  is  clearly  the  one-time  bottom  of  the 
ancient  river.  (Figures  64,  68,  69.)  Lower  terraces  show  where  the 
bottom  of  the  valley  was  at  later  stages.  The  higher  the  terrace  above 
the  bottom  of  the  present  valley  the  older  it  is,  that  is,  the  farther  back 
it  dates  in  the  history 'of  the  river. 

Old  channels  that  are  now  far  above  the  bottom  of  the  valley  were 
at  one  time  the  lowest  parts  of  the  valley.  A  valley  has  been  defined  as 
the  excavation  made  by  a  stream  and  its  antecedents.  The  present 
Sheyenne  River  would  never  erode  such  a  valley  as  that  in  which  the 
river  now  flows.  The  river  is  now  a  small  and  sluggish  stream.  But 
its  antecedents,  the  ancient  channels  which  were  kept  at  flood  by  the 
glacial  wraters,  did  a  tremendous  work  of  erosion.  When  the  river  was 
at  the  Lanona  stage  the  great  valley  had  not  yet  been  cut.  Where  are 
now  the  towns  of  Valley  City,  Fort  Ransom,  and  Lisbon  were  then  the 
firm  solid  earth.  (Figures  66,  71,  78.)  This  remained  to  be  excavated 
during  the  long  time  that  the  river  has  been  working  at  the  task  of 
eroding*  its  valley. 

The  terraces  at  Valley  City,  shown  in  Figures  65,  66,  67,  represent 
stages  in  the  down-cutting  of  the  stream  at  this  point.  The  top  of  the 
butte  in  Figure  66  was  a  part  of  the  river's  bed  at  one  time.  The  erosion 
by  which  it  has  been  left  as  an  isolated  hill  with  a  fragment  of  terrace 


THE    SHEYENNE  RIVER. 


141 


FIG.  78.     The  Sheyenne  Valley  at  Fort  Ransom. 
Pliotograph  by  Rex  Willard. 


FIG.  79.     Banks  of  Sheyenne  River  West  of  Fargo. 


142  THE    STORY    OF   THE    PRAIRIES. 

for  its  top  has  been  accomplished  during  the  time  since  the  river  had 
excavated  its  channel  to  lower  levels.  The  terraces  on  the  opposite  side 
of  the  valley  represent  floodplain  levels  at  later  stages  of  the  river. 

The  hill  represented  in  Figure  77  shows  in  its  flat  top  the  oldest 
floodplain  and  the  earliest  stage  of  the  river.  'This  fragment  of  the 
old  floodplain  was  cut  around  so  as  to  form  an  outlying  hill  by  erosion 
of  main  stream  and  tributaries  during  later  stages.  The  small  hill  that 
stands  above  the  terrace  and  which  the  terrace  surrounds,  is  a  small 
fragment  that  was  not  carried  away  by  the  earliest  stream. 

At  one  time  the  Sheyenne  River  flowed  east  of  the  water  tank  at 
Valley  City  (Figure  65).  This  of  course  was  long  before  the  great 
valley  forming  the  bend  around  to  the  westward  had  been  excavated. 
Similarly,  a  cut-off  channel  shows  where  the  river  once  flowed  many 
feet  above  the  town  and  to  the  west  of  the  city  of  Lisbon. 

Many  such  abandoned  channels  representing  the  ancient  water 
courses  occur  along  the  Sheyenne  Valley.  In  a  general  way  the  higher 
these  old  channels  above  the  bottom  of  the  present  valley  the  more 
ancient  they  are.  Many  ox-bow  cut-offs  occur  on  the  alluvial  flood- 
plain  of  the  present  valley.  If  the  stream  should  erode  its  valley  deeper 
and  some  of  these  abandoned  ox-bows  should  be  left  higher  up  on  the 
sides  of  the  valley  they  would  be  the  same  kind  of  relics  showing  the 
former  course  of  the  river  as  those  referred  to  and  shown  in  the  cuts. 

That  the  Sheyenne  Valley  has  been  excavated  by  a  larger  stream 
than  the  modern  Sheyenne  River  is  shown  by  the  broad  terraces,  and 
that  it  has  been  eroded  deeply  into  the  shale  underlying  the  drift  is 
shown  by  the  shale  exposed  in  the  sides  of  the  valley  at  many  points. 
(Figures  65,  76,  77.)  The  sides  of  the  valley  are  steep  and  the  shale 
rock  has  not  been  greatly  changed  by  the  action  of  the  weathering 
agencies.  These  show  that  the  valley  has  been  excavated  in  recent 
geologic  time.  That  it  was  eroded  by  glacial  waters  forming  a  large 
stream  is  shown  by  the  long  course  of  the  stream,  the  few  branches, 
and  the  deep  and  large  character  of  the  valley. 


R          5  (,        W 


R       55       W 


10 


FIG    80.    Map  Showing  the  Glacial  Channels  of  the  Maple  River. 


CHAPTER  THE  THIRTEENTH. 
THE  HISTORY  OF  MAPLE  RIVER. 

The  history  of  the  Maple  River  is  closely  associated  with  the  progress 
of  recession  of  the  great  ice  sheet.  The  region  traversed  by  this  stream 
and  its  branches  so  well  illustrates  the  close  relationship  between  the 
present  drainage  and  that  established  by  the  streams  of  ice  water  from 
the  great  ice  sheet  that  a  study  may  well  be. made  of  this  as  a  typical 
region.  The  modern  Maple  is  a  small  stream,  but  like  the  Sheyenne,  it 
occupies  a  very  large  valley  in  comparison.  The  main  stream  and  its 
branches  comprise  a  small  system,  but  for  this  very  reason  it  can  be 
more  readily  studied.  The  same  principles  of  ice  movement  and  melting 
that  determined  the  positions  of  these  small  streams  have  also  deter- 
mined many  large  streams. 

The  drainage  of  the  greater  part  of  North  Dakota  east  of  the  Mis- 
souri River  has  been  determined  in  much  the  same  manner  as  has  that 
of  the  Maple  basin.  This  means  that  the  streams  have*  been  located  upon 
the  land  in  a  very  different  manner  from  that  of  drainage  streams  gen- 
erally. In  regions  untouched  by  the  ice  sheet  the  river  valleys  have 
been  formed  by  the  run-off  from  rainfall  and  melting  snows.  In  the 
case  of  this  region  the  channels  were  formed  by  water  delivered  in 
relatively  large  quantities  at  the  edge  of  the  melting  glacier.  As  a 
result  the  rivers  are  long,  their  channels  are  large,  and  there  are  very 
few  tributaries.  This  is  another  way  of  saying  that  the  land  at  the 
present  time  is  not  drained  at  all.  The  land  is  crossed  by  stream  chan- 
nels that  have  no  relation  to  modern  drainage.  This  is  why  it  is  possi- 
ble to  have  large  river  valleys  and  yet  have  almost  no  drainage.  It  is 
as  though  systems  of  valleys  had  been  superimposed  or  let  down  upon 
the  landscape  fully  developed.  And  this  is  really  about  the  fact.  The 
vast  floods  of  water  that  came  from  the  melting  of  the  great  continental 
ice  sheet  had  to  get  away  somewhere,  and  they  stood  not  on  the  order 
of  their  going.  They  just  went  wherever  they  could  go  most  easily. 
On  the  comparatively  level  plain  in  front  of  the  glacier  the  accumulating 
waters  found  no  ready  means  of  escape.  There  were  no  channels 


143 


144  THE    STORY    OF    THE    PRAIRIES. 

already  established,  for  such  as  had  been  excavated  had  all  been  filled 
up  during  the  passage  of  the  great  ice  sheet  over  the  land.  Now  as  this 
tremendous  mass  of  ice  melted  the  waters  had  to  escape  as  best  they 
could,  and  therefore  many  large  channels  were  eroded  by  the  ice  waters 
as  they  passed. 

Once  these  channels  were  established  they  had  to  stay.  Now  when 
the  rains  fall  upon  the  land  behold  here  are  these  old  channels  ready 
made.  There  is  not  half  enough  rain  to  make  streams  for  all  of  them. 
The  result  is  that  here  are  the  large  channels  or  valleys  with  little  water, 
and  during  much  of  the  year  often  with  none  at  all. 

The  Beginnings  of  the  Maple  River. — At  the  time  that  the  edge 
of  the  great  continental  glacier  lay  upon  the  Alta  Ridge  and  the  Fergus 
Falls  moraine  was  being  formed,  there  was  as  yet  no  Maple  River.  The 
region  now  occupied  by  this  system  of  channels  was  buried  underneath 
the  vast  mass  of  the  great  ice  sheet.  The  Sheyenne  was  then  being" 
flooded  by  the  waters  that  came  from  the  melting  of  the  ice  along  its 
edge  and  upon  its  top.  The  channels  of  the  Maple  system  began  to  be 
eroded  after  the  ice  had  melted  back  toward  the  east  so  that  its  edge 
was  somewhere  along  an  irregular  line  extending  from  the  vicinity  of 
Buttzville  north  and  west  to  Fingal  and  Oriska.  It  is  not  thought,  how- 
ever, that  the  edge  of  the  ice  was  anything  like  as  nearly  uniform  as 
would  be  suggested  by  even  a  crooked  line  from  Buttzville  to  Fingal 
and  northward.  It  seems  more  likely  ^that  the  ice  border  was  very 
irregular,  and  not  only  this  but  it  probably  melted  back  and  then  ad- 
vanced again  locally.  When  the  edge  of  the  ice  was  at  Buttzville  it  was 
probably  as  far  west  as  Fingal,  the  morainic  hills  in  Raritan  Township, 
and  those  north  of  Fingal  in  Binghampton  and  Springvale  Townships, 
and  also  those  north  and  west  of  Oriska,  being  thought  to  have  been 
formed  at  this  time.  The  accompanying  map,  Figure  80,  shows  some- 
thing of  the  supposed  relation  of  the  development  of  the  channels  to 
the  retreating  ice  front.  This  sketch  map  is  not  claimed  to  be  strictly 
correct,  but  a  careful  study  of  the  relations  of  the  channels  to  the 
morainic  hills  and  ridges  in  the  field  lends  assurance  that  the  map  sug- 
gests an  approximation  at  least  to  the  true  history  of  the  events. 

A  broad  channel  having  a  gravelly  bottom,  with  gravel  exposed  in 
its  banks,  takes  its  origin  north  and  west  of  Fingal  and  extends  to  the 
south  and  east  along  what  was  probably  the  edge  of  the  ice  to  the  south- 
west corner  of  Pontiac  Township.  Here  it  entered  the  channel  of  what 


THE    HISTORY    OF    MAPLE    RIVER.  145 

is  now  the  modern  South  Branch  of  the  Maple.  In  Section  26,  Raritan, 
a  channel  from  the  west  joins  the  Fingal  Branch.  This  channel  takes 
its  origin  five  or  six  miles  west  in  Thordenskjold  Township.  Before 
the  ice  had  melted  so  as  to  uncover  the  region  later  occupied  by  the 
Fingal  channel  this  stream  flowed  in  a  southeasterly  direction  from 
Section  27,  Raritan,  entering  the  channel  of  the  South  Branch  in  Sec- 
tion 14,  Moore  Township.  This  channel  now  contains  no  water  except 
in  standing  pools  during  time  of  heavy  rains  and  melting  snows.  It 


FIG.  81.    Section  of  Glacial  Channel  (Branch  of  Maple). 

Section  32,  Binghamton  Township.     Bottom  of  Valley  is  a  hay  meadow;  no  modern  stream 

channel;  sand  and  gravel  exposed  in  sides;  gravel  probably  under  the 

soil  of  the  bottom. 

was  the  earliest  channel  of  the  Maple  system  to  be  formed.  It  was  the 
water  escaping  by  this  course  that  first  begun  the  task  of  eroding  the 
large  channel  of  the  South  Branch. 

The  earliest  Maple  River  therefore  was  a  glacial  stream  emerging 
from  the  ice  border  in  eastern  Thordenskjold  Township,  and  having  a 
southeasterly  course  to  Section  14,  Moore  Township,  and  thence  south 
southwest  to  the  Sheyenne  River.  (See  i-i,  Figure  80.)  This  was  soon 
reinforced,  however,  by  the  Fingal  branch,  after  another  recession  of 
the  ice  front,  the  two  uniting  in  Section  26,  Raritan,  and  flowing  near 
to  the  ice  border  to  Section  31,  Pontiac  Township,  about  four  miles 


*•- 


Drijf 


FIG.  82.    Section  of  Glacial  Channel  (Branch  of  Maple). 

Section  34,  Weimer  Township.    Gravelly  banks;  no  modern  stream  channel; 
a  little  water  in  pools.    (See  pp.  37,  51-54). 

north  and  west  of  Enderlin,  where  it  was  forced  by  the  wall  of  ice 
to  turn  southward.  It  pushed  its  way  to  the  eastward  by  an  irregular 
channel  for  a  distance  of  about  two  miles,  thence  turning  west  and 


146  THE    STORY    OF   THE    PRAIRIES. 

south  till  this  stream  entered  the  channel  already  eroded  south  and  west 
to  the  Sheyenne  from  Section  14,  Moore. 

An  Embayment  in  the  Ice  Margin — When  the  ice  had  melted 
back  still  farther  a  channel  was  formed  extending  a  mile  east,  but  again 
turned  south  into  the  South  Branch.  The  channel  from  Springvale  and 
eastern  Binghampton  Townships,  which  enters  the  main  valley  in  Sec- 
tion 1 6,  Pontiac,  was  probably  opened  while  that  part  of  the  main  val- 


PIG.  83.    Section  of  Glacial  Channel  (Branch  of  Maple). 

Section  36,  Oriska  Township.    Channel  eroded  in  drift;  no  modern  stream; 

a  little  water  in  pools. 

ley  where  Enderlin  now  stands  was  yet  buried  beneath  the  great  mass 
of  ice.  When  the  ice  had  melted  back  sufficiently  so  that  the  Thor- 
denskjold  and  Fingal  branches  occupied  the  more  eastern  of  the  two 
channels  in  southwestern  Pontiac,  the  ice  margin  is  thought  to  have 
been  far  enough  east  so  that  the  branch  from  Springvale  and  Binghamp- 
ton was  developed,  the  present  main  channel  being  thus  opened  for  a 
distance  of  about  two  miles  in  Pbntiac  Township,  but  the  waters  of  this 
stream  were  deflected  to  the  west  sharply  by  the  barrier  of  ice  in  Sec- 
tion 28,  Pontiac.  The  waters  of  this  branch  probably  joined  with  those 

SOrcls,. 


FIG.  84.    Section  of  Glacial  Channel  (Maple  River  Valley). 

Section  n,  Tower  Township.    Very  small  modern  channel  with  a  little  water  standing 
in  pools;  bottom  of  valley  a  hay  meadow. 

of  Thordenskjold-Fingal  branch  and  passed  to  the  South  Branch  through 
Sections  32,  Pontiac,  and  6,  Liberty. 

At  a  later  time  the  waters  of  these  combined  streams  seem  to  have 
passed  still  farther  to  the  east  by  the  large  channel  in  Sections  32,  33 
and  34,  Pontiac,  and  thence  passed  south  by  the  present  site  of  the  city 
of  Enderlin,  only  to  again  turn  sharply  to  the  westward  to  join  the 
channel  already  developed  to  the  Sheyenne. 


THE    HISTORY    OF    MAPLE    RIVER.  147 

That  the  ice  still  lay  to  the  south  of  this  sharp  bend  in  the  ancient 
stream  is  suggested  not  only  by  the  character  of  the  channel,  but  also 
by  the  broad  belt  of  morainic  hills  in  western  Liberty  and  Casey  and 
eastern  Moore  and  Fuller  townships,  and  it  was  clearly  impossible  for 
the  waters  to  escape  eastward  by  the  present  Maple  Valley,  or  by  any 
eastward  course,  since  the  great  ice  sheet  lay  upon  all  the  land  to  the 
east.  That  the  main  channel  of  the  Maple  was  not  yet  open  north  of 
Enderlin,  and  that  the  waters  made  the  longer  journey  around  by  the 
course  indicated  seems  to  be  shown  by  the  deep 'and  broad  character  of 
these  channels  and  the  smaller  and  narrower  channel  of  the  main  valley 
north  of  Enderlin. 

Before  the  deep  embayment  into  the  ice  front  at  Enderlin  was  formed 
the  edge  of  the  ice  probably  lay  over  and  west  of  the  city  of  Enderlin, 


FlG.  85.     Section  of  Glacial  Channel  (Maple  River  Valley). 

Section  10,  Clinton  Township.    Modern  stream  channel  10  feet  deep,  dividing  the  old 
floodplain  into  terraces;  old  floodplain  20  feet  below  general  prairie  level. 

a  lobe  or  tongue  of  ice  lingering  north  of  the  city  where  the  main  chan- 
nel was  later  opened,  and  the  morainic  knobs  and  rounded  hills  in 
western  Clinton  were  probably  being  formed.  It  seems  likely  also  that  the 
knobs  west  of  Tower  City  were  also  formed  in  the  marginal  portion  of 
the  ice  sheet  at  this  time. 

The   Main   Channel   Opened — The  next   important   recession   of   the 
ice  sheet  uncovered  the  region  of  the  upper  course  of  the  main  channel 


FIG.  86.    Section  of  Glacial  Channel  (Maple  River  Valley.) 

Section  33,  Clinton  Township.    Hay  meadow  on  bottom  underlain  by  18  feet  of  gravel  and 

sand;  several  old  channels  on  the  flood  plain;  rolling  topography  of  prairie 

along  the  sides  of  the  valley  shows  that  there  is  no  relation 

between  the  prairie  and  the  valley. 


148 


THE    STORY    OF   THE    PRAIRIES. 


of  the  Maple  as  far  south  as  the  present  city  of  Enderlin.  The  halting 
place  of  the  ice  edge  is  probably  represented  by  the  hills  in  eastern  Casey 
and  Liberty  Townships,  the  rolling  morainic  hills  in  the  region  of  the 
Alice  Chain-of-Lakes  in  eastern  Pontiac  and  Clinton  Townships,  and  the 
round  symmetrical  knobs  in  western  Tower  and  Cornell  Townships. 

The  main  channel  of  the  Maple  from  the  vicinity  of  Tower  City 
southward  to  Enderlin,  together  with  the  western  branches  (it  will  be 
observed  that  all  the  branches  of  the  Maple  join  the  main  stream  from 


----_=_-  -^£T-°-^f  ^'^^•^.4:-t'r.*  V;;.y( .;  ;'.V>  :'•  v.  ^'-^/^C-^Vx^v^V,  <>.'•'  -" 


FIG.  87.    Section  of  Glacial  Channel  (Maple  River  Valley). 

City  of  Enderlin,  section  4,  Liberty  Township.    Showing  terraces,  and  gravel 

underlying  valley. 

the  west)  was  now  open.  The  ice  sheet  still  formed  a  dam  just  east  of  the 
present  site  of  the  city  of  Enderlin,  and  the  waters  were  compelled  to 
turn  westward  away  from  the  ice  wall,  and  were  conveyed  by  the  present 
course  of  the  South  Branch  to  the  Sheyenne. 

Lake  Agassiz  Opened — It  was  not  until  another  recession  of  the 
ice  border  had  occurred  and  the  valley  which  subsequently  came  to  be 
occupied  by  the  waters  of  Glacial  Lake  Agassiz  had  begun  to  be  relieved 
of  its  burden  of  ice  that  the  Maple  finally  became  free  to  discharge  its 
waters  eastward  by  the  present  course  into  Lake  Agassiz  in  Section  32, 
Highland  Township. 

At  the  time  of  the  opening  of  the  main  channel  east  of  Enderlin  the 


Sords. 


•*$$$£ 

;0.f-<\"i-.->B»- 


FIG.  88.    Section  of  Glacial  Channel  (South  Branch  of  Maple). 

Section  27,  Moore  Township.   Valley  bottom  90  rods  in  width;  hay  meadow  on  bottom;  sides 
30  to  40  feet  high,  with  very  small  modern  stream  channel;  no  water  except  in  pools. 


THE    HISTORY    OF    MAPLE    RIVER  149 

great  channel  now  occupied  by  the  South  Branch,  which  had  been  car- 
rying the  waters  brought  away  from  the  ice  border  during  a  long  period 
of  recession  of  the  ice,  and  had  been  a  part  of  the  trunk  or  main  line 
of  the  Maple  during  this  time,  now  ceased  to  be  a  part  of  the  course  of 
the  main  stream  and  became  what  it  now  is,  a  reversed  water-way  occu- 
pied by  a  small  intermittent  modern  stream. 

The  South  Branch  now  enters  the  main  valley  at  Enderlin.  It  is  an 
interesting  example  of  a  great  river  from  which  its  glory  has  departed. 
It  used  to  carry  vast  floods  of  water  from  Enderlin  to  the  Sheyenne.  Now 
it  brings  a  little  water  (very  little  during  most  of  the  year)  from  within 
a  mile  or  two  of  the  valley  of  the  Sheyenne  in  the  opposite  direction  to 
the  Maple.  The  channel  is  a  large,  well  defined  valley,  having  steep 
sides  thirty  to  forty  feet  high  in  northeastern  Moore  township,  and  from 
fifteen  to  thirty  feet  high  in  southern  Moore  and  Fuller  Townships. 
(See  Figures  88  and  89.)  Very  little  water  passes  through  the  chan- 


FIG.  89.    Valley  of  South  Branch  of  Maple  River.     A  Glacial  Channel. 
Photograph  by  Rex  IVillard. 

nel  now  except  during  the  spring  season.  In  fact,  throughout  much  of 
its  course  the  channel  bottom  is  a  fine  level  hay  meadow.  Gravel  shoul- 
ders occur  along  its  course,  showing  the  action  of  a  large  stream  at 
flood  tide.  This  old  channel  is  a  marked  landscape  feature,  and  can  be 
easily  followed  from  Enderlin  to  Section  20,  Fuller  Township,  where 
it  joins  the  Sheyenne  Valley  by  a  hanging  valley  about  seventy-five  feet 
above  the  present  Sheyenne  River.  It  is  called  a  hanging  valley  because 
it  is  literally  "hung  up"  above  the  present  river,  the  present  valley  having 
been  eroded  since  this  channel  was  formed. 


150 


THE    STORY   OF   THE    PRAIRIES. 


It  was  not,  therefore,  till  the  ice  had  melted  off  from  the  entire 
region  occupied  by  the  Maple  system,  with  the  possible  exception  of  the 
extreme  northern  headwaters,  that  the  full  Maple  system  became  estab- 
lished in  its  present  course.  By  this  time  Glacial  Lake  Agassiz  had 
begun  to  be  formed  by  the  enlargement  of  the  Sheyenne  River  in  the 
vicinity  of  the  present  town  of  Milnor,  the  waters  of  the  Sheyenne  being 
discharged  between  the  wall  of  the  retreating  ice  sheet  on  the  east  and 
the  higher  land  on  the  west,  ten  miles  south  of  the  southeast  corner  of  the 
area  shown  on  the  map  (Figure  So). 


FIG.  90.    Section  of  Glacial  Channel  (Maple  River  Valley). 
Sections  2  and  3,  Liberty  Township.    One  mile  east  (below)  City  of  Enderlin. 

The  rolling  morainic  topography  in  the  region  of  the  more  eastern 
headwaters  of  the  Maple  system  has  a  north-northwest  trend  in  the 
alignment  of  the  hills  and  ridges,  which  is  considered  evidence  that 
the  region  of  the  eastern  branch  of  the  head  streams  of  the  Maple  sys- 
tem had  not  yet  been  uncovered,  this  region  being  the  latest  to  be  freed 
from  the  burden  of  ice. 


FIG.  91.    A  Kame.    One  mile  west  of  Sheldon.    Photograph  by  C.  M.  Hall. 


CHAPTER  THE  FOURTEENTH. 
THE  LAKES  OF  NORTH   DAKOTA. 

The  Kinds  of  Lakes.— If  we  glance  at  a  map  of  North  Dakota  it  will 
be  seen  that  all  that  portion  of  the  State  west  of  the  Red  River  Valley 
and  east  of  the  Missouri  River,  except  the  Mouse  River  Valley,  is  dotted 
with  lakes,  and  there  are  hundreds,  yes,  thousands,  of  small  lakes  not 
shown  on  even  the  largest  maps.  These  are  "glacial  lakes" — that  is,  lakes 
which  occupy  basins  or  hollows  amongst  drift  hills.  They  are  more  com- 
mon among  the  hills  of  terminal  moraines,  and  hence  are  often  called 
"morainic  lakes." 

Lake  Agassiz,  which  covered  the  Red  River  Valley,  Lake  Souris, 
which  covered  the  lower  Mouse  River  Valley,  and  Lake  Dakota,  which 
occupied  the  Valley  of  the  Lower  James  River,  a  small  part  of  which 
lake  extended  into  North  Dakota,  and  Lake  Sargent,  covering  most 
of  Sargent  County,  were  glacial  lakes;  but  these  owed  their  existence 
to  the  presence  of  the  melting  ice-sheet,  and  they  lasted  only  so  long 
as  the  ice-sheet  remained  to  fill  their  basins  with  water,  and  at  the  same 
time  to  dam  the  northern  drainage  courses,  except  in  the  case  of  Lake 
Dakota,  which,  as  we  have  seen,  was  dammed  at  its  southern  end  by 
a  ridge  of  hard  rock.  These  lakes  disappeared  with  the  final  melting 
of  the  ice-sheet;  they  are  therefore  called  extinct  lakes. 

The  Cause  of  Existing  Lakes.— All  existing  lakes  in  North  Dakota 
owe  their  being  to  the  fact  that  the  rainfall  is  greater  than  the  evapora- 
tion, and  the  hemming  in  of  their  waters  by  morainic  hills  or  other  land 
barriers  which  form  the  sides  of  their  basins.  They  are  "glacial  lakes," 
therefore,  not  because  their  waters  come  from  the  melting  of  the  ice  of 
a  glacier,  but  because  the  glacier  which  was  once  here  caused  their 
basins  to  be  formed  among  the  heaps  and  ridges  of  earth  left  where  it 
melted. 

A  good  deal  of  the  drift  is  clay,  and  this  holds  water  about  as  well 
as  a  porcelain  dish.  Wherever  there  is  a  hollow  in  which  more  water 


151 


152  THE    STORY    OF   THE    PRAIRIES. 

falls  or  collects  than  disappears  by  evaporation  or  soaking  into  the 
ground  there  will  be  a  lake,  and  it  is  called  a  "glacial  lake"  if  its  basin 
was  formed  by  the  action  of  the  ice  of  the  great  ice-sheet.  All  the  lakes 
in  North  Dakota  are  glacial  lakes. 

It  is  not  necessary  that  the  land  forming  the  basin  of  a  glacial  lake 
should  be  entirely  in  drift  deposited  from  the  melting  ice  in  order  for 
it  to  be  a  glacial  lake.  The  materials  from  the  glacier  may  cause  a 
lake  to  be  formed  without  the  entire  rim  of  the  lake  being  of  drift.  A 
river  valley  may  be  partly  filled  with  drift  so  as  to  dam  the  stream  and 
thus  cause  a  lake  above  the  dam.  Such  a  lake  would  owe  its  existence 
to  ice  action  and  hence  would  be  a  glacial  lake.  It  is  likely  that  Devils 
and  Stump  Lakes  were  formed  in  this  manner.  Jim  Lake  and  Arrow 
Wood  Lake  in  Stutsman  County  were  formed  by  the  partial  filling  of 
the  channel  of  the  James  River  by  the  drift  so  that  the  river  is  com- 
pelled to  spread  out  above  the  obstructions  till  the  water  rises  high 
enough  to  flow  over. 

The  lakes  of  North  Dakota  vary  in  size  from  tiny  ponds  only  a  few 
rods  across  to  those  several  miles  in  diameter.  Devils  Lake,  the  Lake 
Superior  of  North  Dakota,  is  forty  miles  in  length,  measured  in  a  direct 
line,  and  it  is  more  than  three  hundred  miles  around  its  shore.  Des 
Lacs  Lake  in  Ward  County  is  nearly  thirty  miles  long,  while  only  from 
a  quarter  to  a  half  mile  wide. 

Sometimes  the  depths  of  glacial  lakes  are  very  great  in  proportion 
to  their  sizes  and  sometimes  they  are  large  and  shallow,  broad,  flat  clay- 
pans  filled  with  water.  Sometimes  the  bottom  drops  suddenly  to  a 
great  depth,  and  sometimes  there  is  a  gradual  slope  of  the  bottom  from 
the  shore  toward  the  centre. 

In  a  similar  manner,  on  "glaciated"  land  surfaces  hollows  are  some- 
times deep  with  their  sides  abrupt  and  steep,  and  sometimes  a  broad 
"flat"  merges  gradually  into  surrounding  hills.  The  deeper  and 
steeper  sided  hollows  in  glaciated  regions  have  been  called  "pots 
and  kettles."  The  broad  and  more  shallow  ones  might  as  properly  be 
called  "pans."  "Pots  and  kettles"  are  very  common  in  terminal  mo- 
raines, and  "pans"  are  common  on  rolling  prairies  between  moraines. 

Exactly  the  counterpart  or  opposite  of  the  "pots  and  kettles"  are 
the  steep,  rounded  knobs  or  knobby  hills  of  terminal  moraines.  Pots 
and  kettles  and  knobby  hills  wherever  seen  are  a  pretty  certain  indica- 
tion of  a  terminal  moraine.  A  gently  undulating  prairie  with  shallow 
depressions  generally  indicates  a  ground-moraine. 


THE    LAKES    OF   NORTH    DAKOTA.  153 

The  great  irregularity  of  the  shores  of  many  lakes  in  North  Dakota 
is  due  to  the  fact  that  they  are  hemmed  in  by  knobby  hills,  and  if  the 
lake  is  large  there  may  be  several  ''pots"  covered  by  the  water  of  one 
lake,  the  water  being  very  deep  where  are  the  pots  and  quite  shallow 
between  them,  or  knobs  may  rise  up,  forming  islands. 

Lakes  may  diminish  in  amount  of  water  they  contain  during  dry, 
hot  seasons,  or  they  may  dry  up  entirely  during  the  driest  part  of  the 
summer.  Such  are  often  called  "dry"  lakes.  Lakes  may  also  be  "dry" 
for  a  period  of  years  when  the  summers  are  seasons  of  unusual  drought, 
and  become  lakes  again  during  a  series  of  rainy  seasons.  If  a  hollow 
is  not  deep  enough  to  hold  sufficient  water  to  form  a  lake  but  rushes 
and  marsh  grasses  grow  upon  its  bottom  it  will  be  a  slough  or  bog. 
There  are  thousands  of  such  sloughs  in  North  Dakota,  and  they  afford 
some  of  the  most  valuable  "hay-meadows"  in  the  State.  Sometimes  a 
stream  flows  from  higher  land  onto  a  tract  of  land  so  nearly  level  that 
the  water  is  unable  to  cross  it  and  so  spreads  out  and  forms  a  marsh 
or  swramp.  Such  marshes,  also  often  making  valuable  hay-meadows, 
occur  upon  the  bottoms  of  old  glacial  stream  channels.  Good  ex^ 
amples  of  this  kind  are  the  flat  bottoms  of  the  old  outlets  of  Lake 
Souris  west  of  Balfour,  and  the  Big  Coulee,  and  very  many  over 
the  great  Missouri  Plateau  where  glacial  channels  were  cut  by  the 
waters  from  the  melting  Glacier  flowing  across  to  the  Missouri  River. 

Since  the  walls  which  hem  in  the  waters  of  glacial  lakes  are  the 
materials  dumped  from  the  melting  ice,  and  since  these  materials  are 
often  left  in  very  irregular  piles  and  ridges,  the  outlines  or  shores  of 
glacial  lakes  are  often  very  irregular,  the  shore-line  of  the  lake  winding 
around  all  the  irregularities  of  the  hills  which  hem  in  the  waters  of  the 
lake.  Sweetwater  Lake,  in  Ramsey  County,  is  a  good  example  of  such 
a  lake  having  very  irregular  shore,  though  there  are  many  hundreds 
of  smaller  lakes  in  the  State  which  are  equally  good  examples. 

In  the  case  of  a  lake  formed  by  the  damming  of  a  river  valley  by  the 
drift  the  shore-line  will  follow  not  only  the  windings  of  the  stream 
course  and  the  curves  around  the  hills  dumped  into  the  valley,  but 
will  reach  out  into  the  tributary  valleys  forming  bays.  The  very  irregu- 
lar shore-line  of  Devils  Lake  is  probably  due  to  all  three  of  these 
causes. 


CHAPTER  THE  FIFTEENTH. 
SALT  AND  ALKALINE  WATERS  IN  LAKES. 

The  Salts  in  Lake  Waters.— The  waters  of  many  lakes  are  not  only 
"salt,"  but  they  are  often  bitter.  This  is  because  there  are  bitter  "salts" 
in  the  water.  Our  common  table  salt  is  what  the  chemist  calls  Sodium 
Chloride.  This  gives  the  "salt"  taste  to  the  w^ater.  There  is  also 
Sodium  Sulphate  and  Magnesium  Sulphate  in  the  water  of  many  lakes, 
and  this  is  bitter  to  the  taste  and  affects  the  digestive  organs  of  animals 
that  drink  it.  There  are  also  other  salts  such  as  the  Sulphates  of  Potas- 
sium and  Calcium  (lime),  and  the  Carbonates  of  Magnesium,  Potas- 
sium and  Calcium.  If  common  salt  or  Sodium  Chloride  is  present  in 
the  water  in  larger  quantity  than  any  of  the  others  the  water  is  called 
"salt"  water.  If  it  contains  a  larger  quantity  of  some  salt  which  is 
bitter  to  the  taste  it  is  apt  to  be  spoken  of  as  "bitter"  or  "alkali"  water. 

Waters  which  are  "hard"  contain  some  kind  of  salt,  usually  Calcium 
Carbonate  or  Calcium  Sulphate  (gypsum).  Rain  water  is  "soft"  be- 
cause when  water  is  evaporated  the  mineral  salt  is  left  behind,  and 
when  the  vapor  condenses  into  clouds  and  falls  as  rain  it  is  free  from 
any  salt.  Not  all  waters  which  contain  salts  are  "hard,"  nor  are  all 
"soft"  waters  free  from  salts.  The  waters  from  the  artesian  wells  at 
Jamestown  and  Devils  Lake  are  "soft,"  but  they  contain  a  large 
amount  of  salts.  These  waters  are  not  hard  because  the  salts  in  them 
are  not  such  as  to  give  the  water  the  character  of  "hardness."  Hard 
water  is  not  good  for  washing  because  the  salt  in  it  forms  a  chemical 
combination  with  the  soap  and  a  new  "soap"  is  formed  which  will  not 
dissolve  in  water.  The  soap  thus  formed  floats  on  the  surface  of  the 
water,  forming  a  greasy  "scum." 

Hard  waters  are  agreeable  to  the  taste  and  are  generally  good  for 
drinking  if  not  too  hard.  Water  which  is  hard  from  the  presence  in  it 
of  Calcium  Carbonate  can  be  "softened"  or  "purified"  by  boiling,  which 
causes  the  limestone  to  fall  to  the  bottom  as  a  fine,  white  powder,  or  to 

154 


SALT  AND  ALKALINE  WATERS  IN  LAKES.  155 

collect  in  scales  on  the  sides  of  the  vessel  in  which  it  is  boiled.  This  is 
called  "temporary"  hardness.  Water  which  contains  Calcium  Sulphate 
or  gypsum  is  "permanently"  hard  for  it  is  not  affected  by  boiling. 

The  Sources  of  the  Salts  and  Alkalies. — The  explanation  of  the  origin 
of  the  salts  in  "alkali"  waters  lies  in  the  fact  that  these  minerals  are  in 
the  rocks  of  the  earth.  The  Cretaceous  shales  contain  them,  for  they 
were  present  in  the  sea-waters  at  the  time  these  rocks  were  deposited 
on  the  bottom  of  the  ocean.  We  shall  see  in  a  later  chapter  that  a 
great  arm  of  the  ocean  once  covered  North  Dakota  and  the  rocks 
which  underlie  the  drift  were  deposited  as  sediments  on  its  bottom. 
The  ice  of  the  Great  Ice-Sheet  ploughed  up  these  rocks  and  ground 
them  into  the  fine  soil,  sand  and  clay  which  now  covers  the  old  land 
surface.  What  has  been  called  in  a  former  chapter  "New  North  Da- 
kota" has  been  made  from  the  broken  and  pulverized  top  of  "Old 
North  Dakota."  The  till  or  drift  earth  which  was  thus  ploughed  up 
from  the  Cretaceous  shales  has  given  to  the  soil  its  alkaline  character. 
The  salts,  Sodium  Sulphate  and  Magnesium  Sulphate,  are  among  the 
minerals  in  the  soil,  but  other  salts  which  dissolve  in  water,  such  as 
Potassium  Sulphate  and  Sodium  Carbonate,  also  occur,  and  altogether 
make  up  the  "alkali"  which  distinguishes  the  soils  and  the  waters  of 
this  region  from  those  of  the  northern  states  farther  east. 

The  minerals  or  salts  which  make  the  water  "hard"  are  Calcium 
Carbonate  (limestone)  and  Calcium  Sulphate  (gypsum).  These  have 
been  derived  also  from  the  Cretaceous  shales.  Pure  limestone  is  the 
mineral  Calcium  Carbonate,  and  the  drift  which  has  come  from  a  lime- 
stone region  contains  this  rock  pulverized  in  the  soil,  and  so  this  be- 
comes a  cause  of  hardness  of  the  waters.  In  the  Red  River  Valley  and 
also  farther  West  the  drift  contains  a  large  amount  of  this  rock  which 
has  been  ground  to  powder,  and  this  adds  greatly  to  the  productive- 
ness of  the  soil. 

These  salts  are  therefore  seen  to  be  in  the  soil  and  when  the  rain 
falls  upon  the  ground  it  dissolves  them  and  becomes  "hard"  or  "salt" 
again,  and  as  the  waters  flow  down  the  coulees  or  streams  into  the 
lakes  and  there  again  are  evaporated  the  lakes  become  "salt"  or  "al- 
kali." If  the  lakes  have  outlets  then  the  salt  is  carried  on  in  the  water 
which  flows  out  of  the  lakes  and  away  to  the  ocean,  and  as  the  ocean 
cannot  have  an  "outlet"  the  waters  of  the  seas  become  salt. 

Salt  Beds  on  Dry  Lake  Bottoms. — Sometimes  a  large  inland  lake  be- 
comes so  salt  from  the  long  continued  evaporation  of  the  waters,  a  little 


156  THE    STORY    OF    THE    PRAIRIES. 

salt  being  generally  present  in  the  waters  of  the  earth's  surface,  that 
the  lake  becomes  a  great  tank  of  brine,  and  after  a  while  becomes  so 
"strong"  that  it  cannot  hold  any  more  salt  in  solution,  and  finally  salt 
begins  to  fall  to  the  bottom.  Or  if  the  lake  is  small  so  that  it  frequently 
becomes  dry  the  salt  left  by  evaporation  upon  the  bottom  may  not  all 
be  re-dissolved  when  the  waters  again  fill  the  basin.  If  but  little  mud 
or  fine  earth  is  carried  into  the  lake  by  streams  and  the  "salt"  in  the 
water  is  mostly  "common  salt,"  beds  of  salt  will  accumulate  on  the 
bottom  of  the  lake.  These  may  become  of  considerable  thickness  and 
may  be  almost  pure  salt. 

Now,  if  for  any  reason  a  lake  where  this  process  has  been  going  on 
for  a  long  time  should  permanently  dry  up  here  might  be  salt  beds  of 
great  value.  Such  salt  beds  occur  in  some  of  the  Western  States, 
where  the  dry  salt  can  be  shoveled  from  the  ground  in  great  quantities. 
It  is  said  that  salt  has  been  shoveled  up  and  hauled  away  in  wagons  for 
stock  purposes  from  such  salt  lakes. 


CHAPTER  THE  SIXTEENTH. 

MAP  STUDIES:   DISTRIBUTION  OF  THE   LAKES  UPON   THE 

LANDSCAPE. 

Map  Studies;  The  Lakes  of  North  Dakota. — A  map  ought  to  mean 
more  than  dots  and  lines  and  shaded  areas.  We  ought  to  be  able  to 
see  in  a  map  of  the  State  a  picture  of  the  landscape.  The  "map  stud- 
ies" in  our  geographies  do  not  sometimes  mean  as  much  as  they  ought 
to.  Let  us  notice  the  distribution  of  the  lakes  of  our  State  and  see  if 
we  can  make  these  have  a  meaning  as  landscape  features. 

In  the  light  of  the  studies  we  have  made  in  the  preceding  pages  it 
will  not  be  difficult  to  see  that  all  the  lakes  in  the  State,  while  they 
are  all  "glacial"  lakes  and  hence  all  belong  in  one  great  class,  yet  they 
fall  into  about  a  dozen  groups,  in  each  of  which  groups  there  is  a 
meaning  as  a  landscape  feature. 

The  McLean  County  Group. — Look  first  at  the  group  of  lakes  in 
McLean  county.  Does  their  position  strike  you  as  having  any  sug- 
gestion in  it?  Look  at  the  Map.  Figure  i,  and  you  see  that  the  great 
Altamont  Moraine,  the  one  called  the  First,  or  the  outer  one  formed 
at  the  edge  of  the  great  Dakota  Glacier  of  the  ice-sheet,  makes  a  turn 
or  loop  toward  the  big  elbow  where  the  Missouri  River  turns  south- 
ward. Some  of  the  highest  and  most  rugged  and  stony  drift  hills  in 
the  State  are  here.  You  notice  that  these  lakes  are  in  chains  or  sort 
of  crooked  rows.  This  is  more  than  accident.  When  the  ice  of  the 
great  ice-sheet  had  its  edge  here  great  glacial  streams  poured  from  it 
into  the  Missouri  River,  and  cut  large  valleys  in  the  drift  which  had 
been  left  from  the  melting  ice.  Some  of  them  also  \vere  probably  val- 
leys before  the  ice  came  and  were  not  entirely  filled  by  the  drift.  These 
streams  did  not  last  long  because  the  ice  melted  back  so  that  the  water 
ceased  to  flow  through  them.  A  short  time  though  as  used  in  geol- 
ogy is  usually  a  good  many  years.  Their  bottoms  were  not  in  many 
cases  made  smooth  by  the  streams,  and  when  the  ice  had  melted  and 
the  water  was  no  longer  compelled  to  flow  through  these  channels  the 

ii  157 


158  THE    STORY    OF   THE    PRAIRIES. 

hollows  remained  and  became  filled  with  water  and  formed  lakes. 
When  the  water  is  high  in  the  spring  it  often  overflows  from  one  to 
another  and  may  even  pass  to  the  Missouri  River  in  some  of  these 
old  channels.  It  may  escape  from  Strawberry  Lake  near  Dog  Den 
Butte  across  by  a  long  series  of  lakes  and  sloughs  to  the  river,  and  in 
a  similar  manner  from  Brush  and  Pelican  Lakes  to  the  Missouri  River. 

About  forty  miles  west  of  Fessenden  is  Pony  Gulch,  a  broad  val- 
ley extending  for  many  miles  across  the  great  Missouri  Plateau,  the 
Coteau  du  Missouri.  This  is  a  valley  in  which  probably  a  stream 
flowed  eastward  before  the  drainage  systems  were  changed  by  the  ice 
filling  them,  but  when  the  ice-sheet  lay  over  all  the  eastern  part  of 
the  State,  filling  all  the  river  valleys,  a  glacial  river  probably  flowed  west- 
ward into  the  Missouri  River,  which  you  will  remember  was  not  cov- 
ered by  the  ice.  The  waters  from  Lake  Souris  were  very  likely  car- 
ried across  by  this  channel  to  the  Missouri  for  a  time,  as  we  saw  in 
another  chapter.  The  hollow  places  along  the  bottom  of  this  old  chan  - 
nel  are  now  beset  with  lakes. 

The  Kidder  and  Logan  County  Group. — In  northern  Burleigh,  Kidder, 
western  Stutsman,  Logan,  and  northern  Mclntosh  Counties  is  another 
group  of  lakes  some  of  which  also  mark  old  glacial  channels  where  the 
ice-waters  surged  over  into  the  Missouri  River.  These  lie  in  hollows 
among  the  hills  of  the  First  and  Second  or  Altamont  and  Gary  Mo- 
raines. These  are  all  upon  the  top  of  the  great  Coteau,  or  Plateau 
of  the  Missouri,  and  hence  are  on  the  "Missouri  Slope." 

It  is  probable  that  the  James  River  flowed  across  by  the  Hawk's 
Nest  in  southeastern  Wells  County  by  this  group  of  lakes  in  Kidder 
County  to  the  Missouri  River  at  the  time  of  the  formation  of  the  Third 
or  Antelope  Moraine,  for  at  this  time  the  ice-sheet  covered  the  land 
as  far  west  as  Carrington,  and  its  edge  lay  upon  the  plateau  to  the 
south,  so  that  the  river  could  not  follow  its  present  course  southward. 

The  Chains  of  Lakes — Another  group  consists  of  the  lakes  in  Foster, 
eastern  Stutsman,  and  western  Barnes  Counties.  The  James  River 
flows  for  nearly  thirty  miles  along  the  course  of  the  Fourth  or  Kiester 
Moraine.  The  river  probably  begun  to  cut  its  channel  here  when  the 
moraine  was  being  deposited  from  the  melting  ice  and  the  river  flowed 
along  the  edge  of  the  ice.  Sometimes  the  materials  from  the  moraine 
were  dumped  into  the  channel  of  the  river  so<  that  its  waters  were 
dammed  up  and  lakes  were  formed.  Such  lakes  are  the  Jim  and  the 
Arrow  Wood,  in  northern  Stutsman. 


MAP  STUDIES.  159 

The  Spiritwood  Chain  of  Lakes  and  four  other  chains  of  lakes 
which  cross  or  lie  near  to  the  Northern  Pacific  Railway  between  Valley 
City  and  Spiritwood  station,  lie  in  deep  channels  which  were  the  places 
of  large  glacial  streams  during  the  time  the  ice-sheet  was  melting  back 
from  the  position  of  the  Fourth  or  Kiester  to  the  Seventh  or  Dovre 
Moraine.  Lake  Eckelson  lies  in  one  of  these  old  channels  which  is 
five  miles  long  extending  south  to  Walker  Lake.  Another  lies  about 
two  miles  west,  and  the  old  channel  is  six  miles  long.  Another  also 
about  six  miles  in  length  is  just  east  of  Sanborn,  and  there  is  still 
another  extending  south  from  Hobart. 

These  lakes  are  along  the  bottoms  of  channels  forty  feet  below  the 
general  land  surface.  These  channels  may  mark  the  places  of  old  val- 
leys on  the  pre-glaeial  landscape  which  were  not  filled  by  the  drift  so 
but  that  the  flood  waters  from  the  melting  ice  flowed  in  their  courses 
and  cut  these  channels  in  the  soft  drift  which  partly  filled  them. 

A  Picturesque  Group  in  Griggs  County. — One  of  the  prettiest  groups 
of  lakes  in  the  State  and  surrounded  by  the  most  picturesque  morainic 
hills  is  that  in  Griggs  County,  and  extending  also  north  into  Eddy 
County.  The  group  consists  of  Lakes  Jessie,  Addie,  Sibley,  Clear,  and 
Red  Willow,  besides  many  small  ones,  and  also  the  North  and  South 
Washington  Lakes  in  Eiddy  County,  and  Free  People's  Lake,  on  the 
Indian  Reservation  north  of  the  Sheyenne  River.  From  Devils  Heart 
Hill  across  the  Sheyenne  at  the  Morris  ford  to  McHenry  and  Coopers- 
town  is  a  continuous  series  of  lakes  and  hills.  West  of  Cooperstown 
are  the  high,  steep,  rounded  knobs  of  the  Dovre  Moraine,  rising  sev- 
enty-five to  one  hundred  and  fifty  feet  above  the  surrounding  prairie, 
covered  often  thickly  with  large  granite  and  limestone  boulders,  and 
among  these  hills  are  the  silvery  sheets  of  water  of  the  lakes  named. 
The  Washington  Lakes  in  Eddy  County  are  walled  in  between  the  hills 
of  the  Elysian  and  the  Waconia  (Fifth  and  Sixth)  Moraines.  These 
lakes  are  interesting  as  having  old  forests  with  their  stumps  still  stand- 
ing below  the  water  along  shore,  showing  that  the  water  has  been 
much  lower  in  them  at  some  time.  The  cut  banks  or  cliffs  on  the  sides 
of  these  and  others  of  the  group  show  that  the  water  has  also  been 
considerably  higher  than  it  is  now. 

The  Devils  Lake  Group. — The  long  series  of  lakes  extending  from  the 
small  sheets  east  of  Stump  Lake  for  more  than  100  miles  northwest 
nearly  to  the  Turtle  Mountains,  including  from  the  east  the  two  small 
lakes  east  of  Stump  Lake,  Stump,  Devils,  Ibsen,  Hurricane,  Grass, 


160  THE   STORY   OF   THE   PRAIRIES. 

Island,  and  Long  Lakes,  as  has  been  explained  before,  probably  were 
all  formed  in  the  valley  of  an  old  or  pre-glacial  river  by  the  partial 
filling  of  this  valley  with  drift.  These  lakes,  therefore,  have  a  quite 
different  meaning  as  landscape  features  from  those  in  the  Griggs 
County  group  just  described,  which  are  "morainic  lakes"  pure  and 
simple. 

The  Group  North  of  Devils  Lake — North  of  Devils  Lake  is  a  group 
of  lakes  which  are  cut  off  from  draining  into  Devils  Lake  by  the  range 
of  morainic  hills  which  lies  between  it  and  them.  These  lie  in  broad 
flat  hollows  or  "pans."  This  range  of  hills,  which  belongs  to  the 
Itasca  (Tenth)  Moraine,  lies  close  along  their  southern  shores  and 
holds  their  waters  from  escaping  into-  Devils  Lake,  their  waters  pushing 
up  into  the  hollows  between  the  hills  forming  many  small  bays. 

Quite  a  large  area  to  the  north  is  drained  into  these  lakes,  and  in 
times  of  high  water  or  during  periods  of  years  when  the  amount  of 
rainfall  is  greater,  these  lakes  increase  in  size,  rising  and  spreading  out 
in  area,  and  become  connected  by  sluggish  streams.  They  may  thus 
at  times  become  connected  with  the  Mauvaise  Coulee  and  so  drain  for 
a  time  into  Devils  Lake.  Sweetwater  Lake  has  sometimes  risen  high 
enough  so  that  its  waters  overflowed  the  rim  of  its  basin  and  dis- 
charged directly  across  to  the  south  into  Devils  Lake. 

If  the  position  of  these  lakes  in  relation  to  Devils  Lake  is  noticed 
it  will  be  seen  that  the  three  larger,  Sweetwater,  Dry,  and  the  Twin 
Lakes  (Lake  Irwin  and  Lac  aux  Morts  or  Lake  of  Death),  lie  directly 
north  of  the  three  large  bays  or  arms  of  Devils  Lake.  It  has  been 
suggested  already  that  Devils  Lake  probably  lies  in  the  hollow  of  an 
old  partially  filled  valley  and  that  its  larger  bays  or  arms  may  be  due 
to  tributary  valleys  entering  the  old  main  valley.  The  position  of  these 
lakes,  with  the  moraine  forming  a  barrier  to  prevent  their  draining 
into  Devils  Lake,  suggests  that  they  may  lie  in  the  same  tributary 
valleys  in  which  the  three  large  arms  of  Devils  Lake  lie,  and  that  the 
moraine  which  crosses  these  tributary  valleys  in  an  east  and'  west 
direction  dammed  their  courses  and  so  caused  the  lakes  to  gather 
above  where  the  valleys  are  filled. 

This  suggestion  of  valleys  in  the  old  or  pre-glacial  landscape  of 
this  region  is  further  strengthened  by  the  fact  that  wells  which  are  dug 
or  drilled  about  the  City  of  Devils  Lake  and  in  the  surrounding  country 
vary  very  much  in  depth  within  short  distances,  but  all  penetrating 
clown  below  the  drift  to  the  old  land  surface,  the  Cretaceous  shale. 


MAP  STUDIES.  161 

Along  the  International  Boundary. — A  number  of  lakes  lying  near  the 
International  Boundary  and  east  of  the  Turtle  Mountains  are  good 
examples  of  a  class  of  lakes  which  owe  their  existence  to  the  action  of 
the  ice-sheet,  and  hence  are  ''glacial"  lakes,  but  which  are  not  mo- 
rainic.  They  lie  in  shallow7  pan-like  depressions  in  the  region  between 
moraines.  Their  basins  often  have  their  bottoms  and  sides  in  glacial 
clay  of  till,  but  they  may  also  lie  in  hollows  which  were  scooped  out 
in  the  Cretaceous  shales  by  the  moving  ice.  There  are  many  such 
lakes  in  the  State.  Those  here  described  lie  between  the  ranges  or  belts 
of  hills  of  the  Itasca  (Tenth)  Moraine. 

It  has  been  before  explained  that  the  Itasca  Moraine  extends  across 
the  northeast  corner  of  the  State  in  a  northwest  and  southeast  direc- 
tion. It  is  a  compound  moraine,  being  made  up  of  several  ranges 
or  belts  lying  between  Devils  Lake  and  Pembina  Mountain.  Lying 
between  the  belt  or  wide  range  of  hills  which  extends  from  the  shore 
of  Lake  Agassiz  west  of  Inkster  northwest  to  the  International  Boun- 
dary in  the  northeast  corner  of  Towner  county,  and  the  moraine  lying 
upon  the  top  of  Pembina  Mountain  which  was  formed  on  the  east  side 
of  the  Dakota  Lobe  or  Glacier,  are  Rose  Lake,  six  miles  east  of  Lang- 
don,  Rush  Lake,  near  Hannah,  a  small  lake  near  Mt.  Carmel,  east  of 
Hannah,  and  a  fourth  about  five  miles  north  of  Osnabrock.  Between 
the  range  which  lies  west  of  these  lakes  and  the  next  large  range  still 
farther  west,  which  extends  from  north  of  Lakota  to  the  east  of  Cando 
and  to  the  Turtle  Mountains,  lie  Lac  des  Roches,  near  the  Interna- 
tional Boundary  in  Towner  county,  which  has  been  before  spoken  of 
as  lying  in  the  line  of  outlet  of  old  Lake  Souris,  and  Rock  Lake,  about 
four  miles  west  of  Lac  des  Roches. 

All  these  lakes  have  inflowing  streams  or  small  coulees  feeding 
them.  The  four  first  named  are  drained  by  outlet  streams,  Rose  Lake 
being  drained  by  the  Tongue  River,  Rush  by  the  Pembina  River,  Mt. 
Carmel  by  the  Little  Pembina  River,  and  Osnabrock  by  Park  River. 
All  these  streams  have  cut  deep  channels  into  the  Pembina  Mountain 
highland,  for  in  flowing  down  its  steep  front  their  currents  become 
swift.  They  have  worked  back  and  "tapped"  these  lakes  since  the 
ice-sheet  melted,  that  is,  since  the  close  of  the  Glacial  Period.  In  a 
short  time — short  as  time  is  measured  in  geology — these  lakes  will 
have  been  drained  and  become  meadows,  for  their  outlets  will  be  cut 
down  and  their  waters  will  be  drawn  off. 

But  with  Lac  des  Roches  and  Rock  Lake  the  case  is  different.     No 


162 


THE   STORY   OF   THE    PRAIRIES, 


stream  has  worked  back  so  as  to  tap  them.  Streams  have  worked 
back  from  their  basins  into  the  higher  land  which  surrounds  them  and 
now  bring  water  to  them  but  this  only  makes  them  spread  out  the 
more.  The  old  channel  along  the  course  of  Mauvaise  Coulee  is  almost 
up  grade  till  after  it  crosses  the  belt  of  morainic  hills  to  the  south. 
When  the  flood  waters  of  Lake  Souris  came  this  way  it  forced  a  pas- 
sage over  the  moraine  after  Lac  des  Roches  had  spread  out  so  that  it 
and  Rock  Lake  were  probably  united  into  one  large  lake. 

The  Turtle  Mountain  Group. — When  it  is  remembered  that  this  plateau 
rises    about    600    feet    above    the    surrounding    prairie    it    will    seem 


FIG.  92.    Township  163,  Range  74.     Top  of  Turtle  Mountain,  showing  the  great  number  of  small 

Morainic  Lakes. 


the  more  surprising  that  there  are  so  many  lakes  on  its  top,  for  there 
are  probably  not  less  than  200  large  enough  to  be  shown  on  a  map. 
Fish  Lake,  twelve  miles  north  of  Bbttineau,  its  north  end  extending  a 
little  across  the  International  Boundary,  is  one  of  the  prettiest 
sheets  of  water  in  the  State.  Other  lakes  worthy  of  note  are  Kippax, 
Constance,  Butte,  Magog,  Waukastian,  Nemo  and  many  others. 

It  will  be  seen  from  Figure  i  that  a  broad  belt  of  the  Itasca  Mo- 
raine crosses  the  Turtle  Mountains,  and  many  of  the  lakes  are  "mo- 


MAP  STUDIES.  163 

rainic"  lakes  scattered  amongst  the  rounded  hills  in  little  round  and 
irregular  hollows. 

The  Turtle  Mountain  Plateau  is  about  forty  miles  long  and  twenty- 
five  miles  wide  in  its  widest  part,  lying  mostly  in  North  Dakota.  Its 
top  is  forest  covered,  and  very  much  broken  and  rolling  due  to  the  drift 
hills  of  the  moraine  just  spoken  of,  and  also  to  the  fact  that  the  plateau 
was  cut  up  by  creeks  and  coulees  before  the  ice-sheet  pushed  across  it, 
and  many  of  these  hills  were  too  large  to  be  entirely  leveled  down.  In 
the  hollows  among  the  old,  that  is,  the  pre-glacial,  hills,  which  are  often 
only  partially  rilled  with  drift,  occur  many  of  the  lakes. 

The  Big  Coulee  Group. — Buffalo  and  Girard  Lakes  and  a  series  of 
small  lakes  in  Pierce  county  lie  in  the  valley  which  was  the  outlet  of 
Lake  Souris  before  the  time  of  the  outlet  by  Lac  des  Roches.  These 
lakes  differ  in  character  from  the  great  number  of  small  lakes  which 
are  scattered  among  the  hills  in  that  neighborhood  which  are  morainic 
lakes.  These  which  lie  along  the  bottom  of  the  old  channel  are  formed 
by  the  water  which  collects  there  from  rains,  and  which  cannot  escape 
because  there  is  not  enough  water  to  flood  the  old  channel  so  as  to 
cause  a  current.  The  water,  therefore,  stands  upon  the  bottom  in  the 
low  places,  forming  lakes  and  sloughs.  "Big  Coulee"  Creek  is  a  small 
stream  lying  in  the  valley,  one  of  the  head  streams  of  the  Sheyenne 
River,  but  it  is  a  mere  little  pool  which  soaks  along  the  bottom  of  the 
great  wide  valley.  As  the  Sheyenne  cuts  its  channel  deeper  and  low- 
ers the  mouth  of  the  Big  Coulee  Creek  this  creek  will  become  more 
swift  at  its  mouth  and  drain  the  lakes  which  lie  upon  the  bottom  of  the 
old  channel. 

A  Group  of  Typical  Morainic  Lakes. — The  great  number  of  lakes  in 
western  Benson,  Pierce,  and  eastern  McHenry  Counties  are  morainic 
lakes, — small  and  larger  basins,  or  "pots  and  kettles,"  of  water  hemmed 
in  by  the  steep,  irregular,  and  knobby  rounded  morainic  hills. 

Many  of  these  hills  are  sandy,  from  the  ground-up  sand-rock  of 
the  Fox  Hills  Sandstone  (one  of  the  Cretaceous  formations)  which  is 
the  underlying  rock  south  of  the  Turtle  Mountains.  Some  of  the  lakes 
in  this  group  lie  among  the  sand  blown  hills  (dunes)  of  the  Lake  Souris 
bottom.  These  hills,  which  were  dumped  into  the  lake  as  moraines, 
were  not  entirely  leveled  by  the  waves  of  the  lake,  but  the  sand  of  the 
hills  on  its  southeastern  shore  was  washed  and  assorted  by  the  waves, 
and  this  is  now  blown  by  the  winds  into  dunes,  sometimes  filling  the 


164  THE    STORY    OF    THE    PRAIRIES. 

lakes  which  lie  in  the  hollows.  The  lakes  are  sometimes  entirely  filled, 
just  as  trees  are  buried  by  the  drifting  sand. 

The  "Alkali  Flats." — South  and  west  of  Balfour,  Anamoose,  and 
Harvey,  lying  along  the  foot  of  the  high  front  of  the  great  Missouri 
Plateau,  are  what  are  known  as  the  "Alkali  Flats."  Many  broad  flat 
bottoms  are  occupied  by  shallow  lakes  or  sloughs.  The  water  is 
strong  of  alkali,  as  are  all  the  lakes  farther  west  which  have  no  outlets. 
The  headwaters  of  the  Sheyenne  River  have  a  sluggish  beginning  in 
this  region,  but  there  is  almost  no  fall  toward  the  Sheyenne  in  the 
flat  surface  from  Dog  Den  Butte  to  western  Wells  County.  A  coulee 
from  Pony  Gulch  and  others  from  off  the  high  front  of  the  plateau 
flow  out  upon  the  "flats"  and  spread  out  as  lakes.  The  shores  and 
dry  bottoms  of  the  lakes  are  white  from  the  "alkali"  salt  left  by  evapo- 
ration during  the  dry  season  of  summer.  These  salts  dissolve  again  in 
the  water  when  the  wet  season  returns. 

When  either  a  natural  or  an  artificial  system  of  drainage  shall  carry 
away  the  surface  waters  from  these  regions  "the  flats"  will  become 
valuable  lands.  They  are  rendered  nearly  valueless  now  by  the  ac- 
cumulation of  alkali  by  evaporation  of  the  waters. 

The  "Alkali"  Lakes  in  the  Far  West. — The  lakes  in  western  Ward  and 
Williams  Counties  which  lie  upon  the  top  of  the  high  northern  portion 
of  the  great  Missouri  Plateau,  are  among  the  most  strongly  alkaline,  if 
not  the  most  so,  of  any  in  the  State.  This  is  because  the  rock  strata 
of  which  the  plateau  is  composed,  known  as  the  Laramie  formation 
(Cretaceous),  are  even  more  alkaline  than  those  rocks  which  underlie 
the  drift  in  the  central  and  eastern  portions  of  the  State.  Many  of  these 
alkali  lakes  lie  in  hollows  in  the  underlying  rock,  which  is  covered  by 
only  a  thin  mantle  of  drift.  The  water  of  some  of  these  lakes  is  a 
bitter  brine. 

The  River  of  Lakes.— Another  group  of  lakes  in  Ward  County  is  of 
more  than  usual  interest.  This  is  a  group  nearly  forty  miles  in  length 
which  lies  in  the  old  glacial  river  valley  which  once  brought  the  waters 
of  Lake  Saskatchewan  from  far  north  in  Canada,  and  also  the  waters 
from  the  edge  of  the  melting  ice  all  along  its  course,  to  Lake  Souris. 

There  are  three  lakes  in  this  series,  the  one  farthest  east  and  south 
being  a  small,  pretty  sheet  of  water  one  or  two  miles  long.  This  is 
followed  by  a  marsh  and  low  meadow  which  separate  this  from  the  next 
lake,  which  is  about  three  miles  long.  Then  a  marsh  and  a  meadow 
again  follow  for  a  mile  or  two,  and  then  a  continuous  and  beautiful 


MAP  STUDIES.  165 

sheet,  or  silvery  ribbon,  of  water  extends  to  the  northwest  for  thirty 
miles,  having  a  width  of  about  half  a  mile,  its  northern  end  extend- 
ing about  two  miles  into  Canada.  Des  Lacs  River,  which  drains  (?) 
these  lakes  is  a  small,  narrow  ditch  winding  back  and  forth  across  the 
flat  bottom  of  the  broad  and  deep  valley,  and  enters  the  Mouse  River  at 
Burlington,  about  five  miles  west  of  Minot. 

Salt  Lakes  From  Artesian  Springs. — A  remarkable  group  of  lakes  lies 
upon  the  level  prairies  in  Grand  Forks  and  Walsh  Counties,  between 
the  city  of  Grand  Forks  and  Grafton  and  north  of  Graf- 
ton.  These  are  salt  lakes  which  owe  their  origin  and  the  saltness  of 
their  waters  to  the  same  causes  as  those  which  produce  artesian  wells 
in  the  Red  River  Valley.  Springs  which  furnish  salt  water  burst  out 
upon  the  level  prairie,  the  water  having  the  same  source  far  west  of 
the  Red  River  Valley  as  the  water  which  is  obtained  by  drilling  artesian 
wells  on  the  Red  River  bottom  lands.  In  fact,  these  springs  are  natural 
artesian  wells,  the  water  being  forced  up  through  gravelly  veins  in  the 
drift  or  till  which  fills  the  valley,  and  having  its  "head"  or  source  in  the 
high  lands  which  flank  the  Rocky  Mountains.  These  springs  make 
the  streams  which  start  upon  the  highlands  which  formed  the  western 
shore  of  Lake  Agassiz  streams  of  salt  water.  There  being  not  enough 
fall  to  the  almost  level  prairie  to  cause  drainage  into  the  Red  River 
their  waters  spread  out  into  marshes  and  lakes,  and  the  water  which 
comes  to  the  surface  in  the  region  of  the  lakes  in  springs  adds  to  their 
volume,  and  hence  the  salt  marshes. 


CHAPTER  THE  SEVENTEENTH. 
LAKES  AS  A  LANDSCAPE   FEATURE. 

The  Meaning  of  Lakes  on  a  Landscape.— Lakes  as  a  landscape  feature 
mean  "youth,"  that  is,  the  landscape  is  young  in  the  sense  that  there 
has  not  been  time  for  river  systems  such  as  were  described  in  the  first 
chapter  to  be  developed.  The  landscape  is  as  yet  largely  undrained  by 
streams.  A  comparison  of  that  portion  of  the  State  lying  west  of  the 
Missouri  River  with  the  great  portion  east  of  it  will  show  the  difference 
between  an  "older"  and  a  "younger"  landscape. 

We  have  noticed  already  the  many  lakes  scattered  over  that  part  of 
the  State  which  is  east  of  the  Missouri  River.  West  of  the  river  we  see 
none  marked  on  the  map,  for  there  are  none.  If  there  were  once  lakes 
there  they  have  been  drained.  All  of  the  hollows  have  outlets,  and  are 
valleys.  East  of  the  river  most  of  the  hollows  do  not  have  outlets,  and 
are  basins.  The  landscape  west  is  therefore  "older;"  that  east  is 
"younger."  West  of  the  river  drainage  systems  have  become  estab- 
lished, and  streams  have  cut  the  landscape  into  hills,  and  these  hills  are 
being  worn  down  and  carried  to  the  sea.  East  of  the  river  few  streams 
mark  the  landscape,  and  the  cutting  of  the  prairies  into  hills  has  just 
begun.  West  of  the  river  the  hills  have  been  carved  upon  the  face  of 
the  landscape.  East  of  the  river  the  hills  are  mostly  "dumped"  hills, 
or  heaps  and  irregular  ridges  piled  upon  the  landscape. 

What  has  been  the  cause  of  these  marked  differences  we  have  al- 
ready seen.  It  was  the  great  ice-plow  which  leveled  down  the  hills 
and  filled  the  valleys  of  the  original  landscape  and  piled  these  hills  on 
the  surface  as  it  melted  away.  As  this  great  ice-sheet  reached  only  to 
the  Missouri  River  the  region  west  of  this  river  has  not  been  ploughed 
down  and  leveled  and  covered  with  dumped  hills.  There  the  landscape 
is  "older"  because  the  processes  which  carve  and  fashion  all  landscapes 
have  been  going  on  longer  than  east  of  the  river,  where  they  had  to 
begin  all  over  again  after  the  Glacial  Period. 


LAKES  AS  A  LANDSCAPE  FEATURE.  167 

The  rocks  are  not  any  older  in  years  west  of  the  river  than  they  are 
east  of  it;  in  fact,  the  oldest  rocks  in  the  State,  as  to  the  time  they  have 
been  in  existence  as  rocks,  are  in  the  eastern  part  of  the  State,  as  we 
shall  see  in  a  later  chapter.  It  is  the  form  of  the  landscape  which  is 
older.  When  the  hills  west  of  the  Missouri  River  have  all  been  washed 
away,  or  nearly  so>,  so  that  there  are  no  high,  steep,  flat-topped  hills, 
and  the  whole  region  is  worn  down  to  base-level,  then  the  landscape 
will  have  reached  its  old  age. 

In  all  the  State  east  of  the  Missouri  River  drainage  systems  are  just 
getting  started.  These  are  the  "coulees"  which,  starting  from  the  river 
valleys,  old  channels  and  lakes,  have  pushed  back  upon  the  landscape. 
Wherever  there  is  a  low  place  water  collects  from  the  falling  rain  and  lit- 
tle streams  begin  to  work  back  into  the  surrounding  land.  In  time  larger 
streams  will  become  established  and  their  heads  will  work  back  into 
the  surrounding  land  and  tap  the  lakes.  The  lakes  will  be  drained  by 
the  cutting  down  of  their  outlets,  and  so  in  time  there  will  cease  to  be 
any  lakes,  and  the  prairies  will  have  been  cut  up  into  hills. 

The  rapidity  with  which  river  systems  get  started  in  any  particular 
region  depends  upon  the  mouths  of  the  streams.  If  the  streams  pour 
their  waters  into  a  deep  basin,  or  if  they  fall  suddenly  down  from  a 
highland  or  plateau  upon  a  considerably  lower  plain,  they  will  cut  their 
channels  down  and  push  their  heads  back  rapidly,  and  the  highland 
will  become  soon  dissected  into  hills.  The  landscape  may  be  said  to 
"grow  old"  rapidly.  But  if  the  whole  region  is  low,  that  is,  if  there  is 
no  place  which  is  quite  a  good  deal  lower  into  which  the  waters  can 
discharge,  then  streams  will  push  back  upon  the  landscape  and  cut 
their  channels  very  slowly,  and  the  rain  which  falls  upon  the  land  will 
lie  upon  its  surface  and  in  the  soil  till  evaporation  removes  it. 

Nearly  perfect  examples  of  landscapes  which  are  "growing  old" 
rapidly  are  the  plateau  top  of  Pembina  Mountain,  and  the  top  of  the 
Turtle  Mountain  Plateau.  Of  those  which  are  lingering  long  in  the 
youthful  stage  are  the  almost  perfectly  flat  plain  of  the  Red  River  Val- 
ley, and  the  region  of  the  group  of  lakes  north  of  Devils  Lake.  To  the 
latter  class,  however,  belongs  most  of  the  State  east  of  the  Missouri 
River. 

All  these  regions  began  their  "infancy"  nearly  at  the  same  time, 
which  was  after  the  close  of  the  Ice  Age,  or  the  Glacial  Period.  But 
the  region  of  eastern  Cavalier  and  western  Walsh  Counties,  and  the 
top  of  the  Turtle  Mountains,  will  be  cut  up  into  hilly  landscapes  and  be 


168  THE    STORY    OF   THE    PRAIRIES. 

reaching  "middle  age"  while  yet  the  plain  of  the  Red  River  Valley 
and  the  region  north  of  Devils  Lake,  as  also  much  of  the  State  else- 
where, will  still  be  in  the  age  of  youth. 

This  is  because  the  Reel  River  has  so  little  fall  that  it  cannot  deepen 
its  channel,  and  so  the  coulees  upon  the  prairies  cannot  lower  their 
mouths,  and  the  water  which  falls  upon  the  broad  level  prairies  stands 
in  sheets  until  removed  by  evaporation.  In  the  Devils  Lake  region 
the  fall  in  any  direction  is  so  slight  that  only  the  faintest  beginnings 
of  drainage  have  been  developed.  Mauvaise  Coulee  enters  Devils 
Lake  from  the  north,  but  it  cannot  be  said  to  drain  the  lakes  with  which 
it  is  connected.  It  is  itself  a  long-drawn-out  slough  or  pool  which  is 
broader  at  those  places  where  it  spreads  out  into  lakes. 

In  the  case  of  the  Pembina  Mountain  top  all  the  streams  which  fall 
down  its  steep  front  have  cut  deep  channels.  The  Pembina  River,  the 
Little  Pembina,  the  Tongue,  the  head  streams  or  coulees  of  the  Park, 
the  Forest  and  the  Turtle,  have  all  cut  deep  channels  down  through 
the  drift  into  the  underlying  shales.  This  is  because  of  the  fall  from 
the  top  of  the  high  plateau  down  to  the  low  prairie.  These  same 
streams  all  become  sluggish  pools  after  they  get  upon  the  valley  plain 
and  their  channels  become  long,  puddling  ponds.  The  high  prairie 
upon  the  plateau  top  of  Pembina  Mountain  will  become  cut  up  into 
hills  while  the  Red  River  Valley  still  remains  almost  undrained.  All 
the  larger  lakes  upon  this  plateau  have  already  been  tapped  by  the 
head  coulees  of  the  streams  named. 

The  Turtle  Mountain  Plateau  is  being  cut  into  by  the  coulees  which 
push  their  heads  back  from  the  prairie  up  the  steep  slope  of  the  high 
front.  All  around  the  mountain  on  any  good  map  streams  are  shown 
which  are  pushing  their  heads  back  onto  the  higher  land.  The  old 
valleys  which  were  partially  filled  with  drift,  many  of  which  were 
dammed,  forming  the  small  lakes,  will  be  cut  out  anew,  and  the  lakes 
which  are  scattered  among  the  hills  in  the  hollows  will  be  drained. 
Fish  Lake  and  the  series  of  lakes  lying  near  it  are  in  an  old  valley 
which  was  partly  filled  by  drift.  Oak  Creek  has  cut  a  deep  coulee  into 
the  side  of  the  mountain  and  already  draws  away  water  from  several 
small  lakes  in  the  series.  When  these  have  been  drained  by  the  deep- 
ening of  the  channel  it  will  later  draw  off  the  water  of  Fish  Lake,  and 
finally  the  whole  valley  will  be  re-opened  something  as  it  was  before 
the  great  ice-plow  moved  across  the  mountain's  top. 

A  good  illustration  of  the  tapping  of  a  lake  by  the  cutting  down  of 


LAKES  AS  A  LANDSCAPE  FEATURE. 


169 


a  coulee  channel  and  the  pushing  back  of  its  head  is  furnished  by  Rush 
Lake,  on  the  Pembina  Mountain  highland  near  Hannah. 

It  will  be  seen  in  Figure  93  that  it  has  two  outlets.  The  lake  is 
a  shallow  clay-pan  of  water  only  a  few  feet  deep.  The  north  outlet  is 
the  old  outlet,  one  which  was  established  when  the  water  from  the 
melting  ice-sheet  made  the  lake  larger  than  it  is  now.  Pembina  River, 


FIG.  93.    Map  of  Rush  Lake,  Cavalier  County,  showing  two  outlets. 
From  a  Drawing  by  W.  A.  Hillier. 

which  is  only  a  few  miles  away,  flows  in  its  old,  or  pre-glacial,  channel. 
This  was  partially  filled  with  drift,  which  has  been  mostly  carried  away 
by  the  river,  and  the  river  has  cut  its  valley  still  deeper.  Snowflake 
Creek  has  cut  back  from  the  Pembina  Valley  as  a  tributary,  and  it,  too, 
has  cut  a  deep  gorge  or  channel,  because  its  mouth  is  made  low  by  the 
deep  gorge  of  the  Pembina  into  which  it  empties. 

Now,  it  chanced  that  a  low  place  in  the  land  surface  caused  a  small 
tributary,  /,  to  cut  back  from  Snowflake  Creek  at  the  fork  where  the  two 
outlets  now  meet.  Snowflake  Creek  at  first  had  its  source  in  Rush 
Lake  through  the  north  outlet.  But  this  little  tributary  has  cut  down 
more  rapidly  than  the  north  outlet  owing  to  the  fact  that  more  water 
falls  over  its  sides,  it  being  in  a  slight  depression,  and  so  it  has  pushed 
its  head  rapidly  back. 


170  THE    STORY    OF   THE    PRAIRIES. 

It  happened  that  a  coulee,  c,  leading  into  the  lake  at  o  marked 
a  little  valley.  This  had  its  head  about  where  the  bend  in  the  south 
outlet  is  now.  At  length  the  little  tributary  coulee  from  Snowflake 
Creek  pushed  back  and  began  to  draw  the  water  of  the  little  coulee 
the  other  way.  So  the  little  coulee  which  at  first  flowed  into  the  lake 
was  reversed  and  its  channel  became  a  part  of  the  new  south  outlet. 

This  is  just  about  the  stage  in  which  the  two  outlets  are  now.  The 
north  outlet  is  still  the  main  outlet  of  the  lake,  that  is,  it  carries  a  little 
more  water  from  Rush  Lake  to  Snowflake  Creek  than  does  the  newer 
south  outlet.  But  the  south  outlet  at  t  has  a  deep  gorge  and  it  is 
rapidly  cutting  this  gorge  back  so  that  it  will  soon  lower  the  channel  of 
c,  and  this  will  then  become  the  principal  outlet,  and  soon  the  north 
outlet  will  cease  to  carry  away  water  from  the  lake  entirely.  Because 
the  channel  of  Pembina  River  is  deep  Snowflake  Creek  is  able  to  cut 
deeply  its  channel,  and  soon  the  rim  of  Rush  Lake  at  o  will  be  cut 
down  and  the  waters  of  the  lake  will  be  drawn  away,  and  its  bottom 
will  become  a  meadow. 


172 


CHAPTER  THE  EIGHTEENTH. 
THE  BAD   LANDS. 

Bad  Lands  to  Travel  Through. — No  part  of  North  Dakota  is  perhaps 
more  widely  known  or  less  understood  than  that  part  of  the  State  styled 
the  "Bad  Lands."  Probably  about  no  part  of  the  State  are  there  more 
mistaken  notions  than  about  this  region. 

In  the  first  place  the  lands  are  not  "bad"  for  the  purposes  for  which 
nature  has  fitted  them,  viz.,  for  stock-raising.  This  is  claimed  by  those 
who  ought  to  know  to  be  one  of  the  best  parts  of  all  the  State  for  profit- 
able cattle-  and  horse-ranching.  The  region  was  called  by  the  early 
French  travelers  who  crossed  the  country  in  wagons  "Bad  Lands  to 
Travel  Through,"  which  is  a  very  fitting  and  appropriate  title.  The 
lands  are  not,  in  fact,  so  "bad,"  but  they  are  bad  to  travel  through.  The 
whole  region  is  so  much  cut  up  by  deep  valleys  with  steep  sides  that  it 
is  almost  impossible  to  travel  there  with  wagons.  And  the  tourist  who 
attempts  to  travel  on  horseback  without  a  guide  is  very  likely  to  "get 
lost." 

Mistaken  Notions  About  the  Cause  of  the  Bad  Lands. — Many 
strange  stories  have  been  invented  by  travelers  to  explain  how 
the  lands  of  this  region  came  to  be  so  very  rough.  They  are  often 
described  as  having  been  made  rough  and  jagged  by  great  volcanic  up- 
heavals or  earthquake  shocks !  There  is  scoria  in  the  hills  or  "buttes," 
and  this  has  given  color  to  the  notion  that  great  volcanic  fires  have 
raged  here,  and  the  high  crags  and  rugged  hillsides  with  deep,  narrow 
valleys  appear  to  those  who  have  keen  imaginations  like  great  rents 
or  fissures  in  the  rocks  caused  by  earthquakes.  Then  there  are  many 
veins  or  beds  of  coal  in  the  region  and  some  of  these  are  burning,  and 
this  has  given  rise  to  the  idea  that  great  fires  have  burned  out  the 
chasms,  or  that  the  coal  has  burned  out  underneath  and  the  rocks  over- 
lying have  then  fallen  in,  causing  the  steep-sided,  ragged  gullies. 

But  careful  observation  and  study  will  show  that  none  of  these 
causes  is  the  true  one.  The  earth  has  not  been  formed  in  the  way  we 
now  see  it  by  sudden  changes.  Great  upheavals  of  the  earth's  crust 


173 


174  THE    STORY    OF    THE    PRAIRIES. 

forming  mountain  ranges  and  volcanic  outbursts  causing  floods  of  lava 
to  pour  out  upon  the  surface  from  the  depths  of  the  earth,  have  occurred 
in  many  parts  of  the  earth,  and  the  form  and  appearance  of  the  earth 
have  been  greatly  changed  by  such  processes.  But  these  are  not  the 
causes  which  have  made  the  landscape  features  of  the  Bad  Lands,  nor 
of  any  part  of  North  Dakota. 

The  Real  Cause  of  the  "Bad  Lands."— The  agent  which  has  fashioned 
the  landscape  in  the  "Bad  Lands"  is  the  same  as  that  which  has  been 
working  ever  since  the  solid  crust  of  the  earth  first  appeared  above  the 
seas,  and  dry  land  began  to  receive  rainfall  and  to  be  worn  away  by  it.  The 
"Bad  Lands"  have  been  cut  up  into  "Bad  Lands  to  Travel  Through" 
by  the  action  of  running  water,  just  as  the  plateau  top  of  Pembina 
Mountain  is  being  cut  up  into  hills  by  the  action  of  streams.  The 
buttes  or  flat-topped  hills  of  this  remarkable  region,  the  deep  valleys 
or  gorges  which  surround  the  buttes,  often  so  steep  that  neither  man, 
horse  nor  wild  beast  can  cross  them,  have  been  made  by  the  eroding 
action  of  running  water.  The  same  processes  of  valley  cutting  which 
were  studied  in  Chapter  One  are  the  explanation  of  the  "Bad  Lands." 

The  "Bad  Land"  Region.— A  belt  of  country  from  ten  to  twenty  miles 
wide  in  North  Dakota  along  the  course  of  the  Little  Missouri  River  is 
deeply  intersected  or  cut  into  by  this  river  and  its  tributary  streams. 
The  channel  of  the  Little  Missouri  has  been  cut  by  the  river  deeply 
into  the  landscape  so  that  the  streams  which  flow  into  this  river  have 
steep  bottoms,  that  is,  they  descend  rapidly,  and  this  causes  them  to 
erode  or  cut  down  their  beds  rapidly.  Their  sides,  therefore,  be- 
come steep  and  rugged.  These  tributary  streams  push  back  their 
heads  into  the  land,  as  has  been  explained  before,  and  often  their  heads 
work  back  into  the  plain  so  that  they  meet,  and  so  a  portion  of  the 
prairie  becomes  cut  around  by  the  streams  forming  a  table-land.  If 
this  bit  of  land  thus  surrounded  by  deep  valleys  is  large  it  is  called  a 
plateau  or  a  "mesa."  If  it  is  a  small  area  so  that  it  is  simply  a  flat- 
topped  hill  it  is  called  a  "butte." 

Buttes  and  mesas  are  flat  on  top  because  the  original  plain  or 
prairie  was  flat.  The  sides  of  the  valleys  or  coulees  are  steep  and 
rugged  because  the  streams  which  form  them  cut  down  rapidly, 
and  we  have  seen  before  that  swiftly  flowing  streams  erode  their  bot- 
toms much  more  rapidly  than  do  streams  having  slow  currents. 

In  the  spring  when  the  snows  are  melting,  and  during  seasons  of 
heavy  rainfall  these  streams  are  swollen  and  flow  very  swiftly.  The 


THE  BAD  LANDS. 


175 


FIG.  95.    View  South  of  Missouri  River  near  Williston.     Photograph  by  Rex  Willard. 


FIG.  96.    Naked  Clay  Butte  with  Fluted  Side.    McKenzie  County. 
Photograph  by  Rex  Willard. 


176 


THE   STORY   OF  THE  PRAIRIES. 


rocks  which  make  up  the  landscape  are  clay  and  sandstone  and  shale, 
and  such  rocks  erode  very  easily  under  the  cutting  action  of  swift  cur- 
rents of  running  water.  During  the  hot  months  of  summer  the  coulees 
become  mostly  dry,  the  clays  become  "baked"  and  cracked  by  the  sun's 
heat,  and  the  sandstones  and  shales  become  crumbled.  Then  when 
the  rains  come  and  the  snows  melt  the  rocks  are  easily  broken  and  car- 
ried away  by  the  waters.  Grass  and  other  vegetation  do  not  have 
time  to  get  much  foothold  on  the  steep  sides  of  the  buttes  because  the 
earth  wears  away  too  rapidly,  and  so  the  sides  of  the  buttes  are  gen- 
erally naked  of  vegetation,  except  in  crevices  where  the  washing  is  less. 
The  layers  of  clay,  sandstone,  shale,  and.  often  of  lignite  coal,  are  seen 
in  parallel  series  one  above  the  other  just  as  they  were  laid  down  on  the 
bottom  of  the  ocean. 

Different  Forms  of  Buttes. — The  sides  of  the  buttes  are  worn  away 
year  by  year  as  the  rains  continue  to  wash  their  sides,  and  the  sun  shin- 


FIG.  97.    Pyramid  Butte.     Photograph  by  Prof.  W.  E.Johnson. 

ing  upon  their  unprotected  sides,  and  the  frosts  of  winter,  crack  the  clay 
and  crumble  the  sandstone  and  shales,  and  the  areas  of  the  flat  tops 
become  smaller  and  smaller.  By  and  by  the  flat  top  is 
entirely  worn  away  and  the  butte  "comes  to  a  peak,"  and  then  the  peak 
becomes  lower  and  lower  as  the  wearing  process  goes  on.  Thus  there 
may  be  large  mesas  and  small  mesas,  the  small  mesas  grading  in  size 


THE   BAD   LANDS. 


177 


into  large  buttes,  and  large  buttes  differ  from  small  buttes  only  in  the 
lesser  areas  of  their  tops.  A  large  mesa  may  be  cut  up  into  smaller 
mesas  or  large  buttes,  and  larger  buttes  may  be  cut  into  smaller  buttes, 
by  coulees  pushing  back  and  cutting  up  their  tops.  Finally  the  flat 
tops  become  rounded  tops,  and  then  the  buttes  begin  to  get  lower,  so 
that  there  are  higher  and  lower  buttes,  and  as  the  low,  rounded  buttes 
become  still  lower  and  smaller  they  in  time  wear  away  and  become 
mere  little  naked,  rounded  hillocks  or  "bee-hives." 

If  there  should  be  a  harder  layer  of  sandstone  running  through  the 
butte  the  edges  of  this  harder  layer  will  not  be  worn  away  as  fast  as 
the  rest  of  the  softer  materials,  and  so  this  layer  will  come  to  project 
out  of  the  sides  of  the  butte  as  a  shelf.  If  the  shelf  is  at  or  near  the 
top  of  the  butte  then  the  butte  will  become  a  "table  rock"  or  "capped 
butte."  Sometimes  a  harder  part  of  a  sandstone  layer  or  of  lava  form- 
ing a  crag  or  jutting  mass,  stands  out  on  the  side  or  at  the  top  of  a 
butte,  and  so  a  "pinnacled"  butte  is  formed. 


FIG. 


The  Butte  becomes  a  "Table  Rock  "  or  "Capped  Butte." 
Pltotograph  by  Miss  Nellie  T.  Cruden. 


Outside  the  Bad  Lands. — The  landscape  about  Dickinson,  forty  miles 
east  of  the  Little  Missouri  River,  is  that  of  a  broken  prairie.  The  val- 
leys are  not  so  deep  because  the  headwaters  of  the  Heart  River  have 
to  go  a  long  way  to  the  Big  Missouri  at  Mandan,  and  this  means  that 
the  "fall"  is  not  so  rapid  so  that  the  streams  cannot  cut  their  channels 
down  so  rapidly.  If  the  headwaters  of  the  Heart  River  did  not  have 


178  THE   STORY   OF  THE   PRAIRIES, 

to  travel  the  long  journey  of  about  100  miles  to  the  Missouri  River, 
that  is,  if  there  were  a  place  as  low  as  the  Missouri  River  at  Mandan, 
only  say  ten  miles  east  of  Dickinson,  the  country  about  Dickinson 
would  rapidly  become  "bad  lands,"  for  the  streams  would  quickly  cut 
down  their  channel  bottoms  and  the  prairie  surface  would  soon  become 
the  tops  of  buttes. 

This  is  what  has  happened  thirty  miles  west  of  Dickinson  at  Fry- 
burg,  where  the  streams  flow  west  into  the  Little  Missouri,  descending 
530  feet  in  a  distance  of  about  ten  miles. 

About  twenty  miles  north  of  Dickinson  are  what  are  called  "the 
breaks."  Here  the  gently  rolling  and  grass-covered  prairie  changes 
suddenly  to  a  much  broken  and  rugged  landscape  with  narrow  valleys 
and  buttes  with  naked  sides.  Here  a  stream  with  a  deep  valley  and 
many  tributary  coulees,  the  Knife  River,  has  pushed  back  into  the 
landscape  from  the  Missouri  River  at  Stanton  in  Mercer  County,  and 
the  development  of  "bad  lands"  has  well  begun.  Farther  north,  after 
crossing  the  region  drained  by  the  Knife,  there  is  rolling  prairie  again. 

At  a  distance  of  about  sixty  miles  north  of  Dickinson  the  prairie 
suddenly  drops  off,  as  abruptly  as  off  the  end  of  a  bridge,  into  the  val- 
ley of  the  lower  Little  Missouri  at  the  bend  where  it  turns  east  to  enter 
the  Big  Missouri.  Here  the  Little  Missouri  has  cut  its  valley  down 
like  a  great  trough  400  to  500  feet  into  the  prairie,  and  tlie  side  streams 
have  cut  the  landscape  on  each  side  of  the  river  into  the  most  striking 
and  majestic  buttes  anywhere  to  be  seen  in  the  North  Dakota  Bad 
Lands.  The  change  from  the  grass-covered  prairie  to  the  steep  and 
naked  jagged  buttes  of  the  Bad  Lands  of  the  side  of  the  valley-trough 
is  as  marked  as  stepping  off  from  the  edge  of  a  plank  platform.  The 
traveler  often  has  to  go  along  the  edge  of  the  prairie  for  many  miles 
before  finding  a  coulee  he  can  descend  to  the  river,  although  the  dis- 
tance to  the  river  in  a  direct  line  is  less  than  four  miles.  There  are 
only  one  or  two  places  in  a  distance  of  thirty  miles  where  it  is  practi- 
cable to  get  down  to  the  river,  ford  the  stream  with  its  treacherous 
quick-sands,  and  get  up  again  upon  the  prairie  on  the  other  side  of 
the  valley.  Yet  it  is  possible  on  a  clear  day  to  see  across  from  the 
prairie  on  one  side  to  the  grass-covered  prairie  on  the  other,  the  dis- 
tance across,  which  in  this  region  represents  the  whole  width  of  the 
"Bad  Lands,"  being  from  seven  to  ten  miles. 

But  the  journey  down  from  the  prairie  to  the  river  is  a  most  diffi- 
cult one.  Jagged,  rough  and  steep,  down  into  holes  cut  out  by  tor- 


THE   BAD   LANDS. 


179 


rents  of  water,  around  slippery  clay  buttes,  down  deep  and  steep 
gorges,  over  hard  crags  of  sandstone  which  have  resisted  the  wearing 
action  of  sun,  frost  and  y/ater,  passing  sometimes  a  butte  in  the  sides 
of  which  glisten  countless  crystals,  passing  with  caution  over  a  ledge 
under  which  burns  a  vast  natural  furnace  of  coal,  till  at  length  the  bot- 
tom of  the  valley  is  reached,  where  roll  the  waters  of  the  Little  Mis- 
souri, yellow  with  their  burden  of  sand  and  clay. 

Halting  at  the  hospitable  door  of  a  ranchman's  log  "schack,"  glad 
to  rest  and  hear  again  the  sound  of  a  human  voice,  one  may  well  gaze 


FIG.  99.     "  Halting  at  the  Hospitable  Door  of  a  Ranchman's  Log  'Schack.'  " 

back  in  awe  and  wonder  at  the  lofty  gray  precipices  which  have  been 
passed.  "Bad  Lands  to  Travel  Through"  indeed!  But  there  is  never 
a  lack  of  a  cordial  welcome  at  the  humble,  thatched  cottage  of  one  of 
these  ranchmen  "cattle  kings."  True,  there  is  nothing  to  drink  but 
the  warm  water  of  the  river,  and  this  is  so  muddy  from  its  sediment- 
laden  current  even  in  mid-summer  that  it  is  impossible  to  see  the  bot- 
tom of  a  spoon  which  is  filled  with  it.  But  anything  is  good  enough, 
and  the  best  the  ranchman  has  he  deems  none  too  good  for  the  welcome 
traveler. 

Here  rolls  the  swift-flowing  and  sediment-laden  Little  Missouri,  at 
once  the  cause  and  the  explanation  of  the  "Bad  Lands."  Its  bed  de- 
scends rapidly  so  that  its  waters  flow  swiftly,  carrying  a  great  burden  of 
sand  and  clay,  in  some  places  little  else  than  a  great  moving  stream  of 
quicksand  creeping  down  the  valley.  Rolling  on  and  on,  bearing  its 
mighty  burden  of  sand  and  clay  down  its  steep  course  to  the  Big  Mis- 
souri, it  adds  to  the  muddiness  of  that  great  dirty  river  this  pudding  of 


180 


THE    STORY   OF   THE   PRAIRIES. 


rock,  its  waters  stirred  to  a  soup  with  clay,  a  burden  which  it  has 
brought  from  all  the  coulees  which  girdle  the  buttes  of  all  the  "Bad 
Lands"  from  its  long  course  in  South  and  North  Dakota. 

The  Structure  of  the  Buttes. — One  of  the  most  striking  things  which 
the  traveler  observes  in  the  Bad  Lands  is  the  arrangement  of  the  rocks 
in  the  naked  buttes  in  horizontal  layers.  So  far  from  the  region  being 
one  which  has  been  rent  and  broken  and  upheaved  by  volcanic  or  earth- 
quake action,  so  far  from  the  rugged  form  of  the  hills  being  due  to 
heat  from  eruptions  of  the  earth,  as  has  sometimes  been  said  in 
descriptions  of  this  region,  the  rocks  are  all  horizontal  in  position  and 


FIG.  ioo.  "One  Layer  above  another  like  Boards  in  a  Lumber  Pile."     Pyramid  Park. 
Photograph  by  Prof.  W.  E.Jshnson. 

one  layer  or  stratum  above  another  in  as  systematic  order  as  boards  in 
a  lumber  pile. 

Rocks  which  have  been  upheaved  and  crumpled  and  melted  in  the 
processes  of  mountain  making  are  upturned,  broken,  and  bent,  and  the 
character  of  the  rocks  themselves  changed,  so  that  what  had  been  soft 
clay  or  shale  has  been  changed  into  slate,  and  sandstone  into  quartzite 
in  which  the  grains  of  sand  cannot  now  be  distinguished.  But  no  such- 
changes  have  occurred  in  the  Bad  Lands.  The  rock-layers  are  in 
horizontal  position  just  as  they  were  laid  down  as  sediments  on  the 


THE   BAD   LANDS.  181 

bottom  of  the  sea  long  ages  ago.  The  layers  of  clay  are  still  clay,  and 
the  sandstone  strata  are  sandstone  now,  made  up  of  the  same  grains 
of  sand  as  they  were  when  the  waves  of  the  sea  washed  them. 

All  these  layers  of  rock  belong  in  what  is  called  the  Laramie  forma- 
tion, the  highest  in  the  series,  or  latest  formed,  of  the  Cretaceous  rocks. 

That  these  layers  of  rock,  these  sandstones,  shales,  and  clays,  were 
formed  on  the  bottom  of  a  great  body  of  water  there  can  hardly  be 
doubt,  for  nothing  but  water  can  form  clay  or  fine  sand  into  such 
layers. 

Follow  along  any  particular  layer  in  the  side  of  a  butte  and  then- 
look  across  to  the  other  side  of  the  valley  and  the  same  layer  occurs 
there  at  the  same  height.  Follow  It  on  and  it  has  the  same  position  in 
all  the  buttes.  There  are  the  same  layers  above  it  in  all  its  course, 
and  those  layers  which  are  below  it  can  be  seen  below  it  in  all  the  buttes. 
The  edge  of  a  particular  layer  as  it  is  seen  in  the  side  of  the  hill  is  like 
a  great  ribbon  stretched  along  the  side  of  the  valley.  It  keeps  just 
the  same  thickness  from  one  butte  side  to  another  as  far  as  it  is  fol- 
lowed, till  it  finally  plunges  into  the  ground  below  the  level  of  the 
stream  bottom,  if  it  is  followed  up-stream,  or  rises,  a  little  toward  the 
surface  or  top  of  the  side  of  the  valley  if  it  is  followed  down-stream. 
This  is  what  would  be  expected  if  the  layer  itself  is  horizontal,  for  the 
stream  bed  at  the  bottom  is  not  horizontal  but  rises  up-stream,  and  so 
the  layer  seems  to  come  down  to  meet  the  bottom  of  the  valley,  though 
really  the  stream  bottom  rises  to  meet  the  layer.  The  Rat  land  at  the 
top  of  the  buttes  has  a  slope  down-stream  or  else  the  stream  would 
not  have  been  started,  and  so  the  layer  tends  to  rise  more  and  more 
toward  the  top  when  followed  down-stream. 

The  only  explanation  of  layers  of  rock  so  extensively  horizontal  is 
that  they  have  been  deposited  in  water  upon  the  bottom  of  an  ocean. 

Veins,  or  beds,  of  lignite  coal  occur  along  with  the  layers  of  clay, 
sandstone  and  shale.  They  are  of  various  thicknesses  from  less  than 
an  inch  to  eight  feet  or  more,  and  these  can  be  followed  along  the 
naked  sides  of  the  hills  or  buttes  like  the  other  rock  layers.  Now  if 
lignite  coal,  while  under  the  great  pressure  of  the  weight  of  the  rocks 
above  it  were  to  be  greatly  heated,  as  it  would  be  if  volcanic  action  or 
earthquakes  had  caused  great  upheavals  and  rents  in  the  earth,  it  would 
be  changed  to  anthracite  coal  and  cease  to  be  lignite.  The  fact  that 
there  are  beds  of  lignite  coal  all  through  the  Bad  Lands,  therefore,  is  a 


182 


THE   STORY   OF   THE   PRAIRIES. 


proof  that  heat  from  earth  eruptions  was  not  the  cause  of  the  Bad 
Lands. 

In  many  places  in  this  region  clay  has  been  heated  by  the  burning 
coal  mines  so  that  it  has  been  baked  into  brick,  and  sometimes  also  it 
has  been  melted  so  that  it  looks  much  like  lava.  Where  the  sides  of 
the  buttes  have  crags  of  this  melted  rock  projecting  in  great  masses  the 
region  has  sometimes  the  appearance  of  having  been  rent  by  volcanic 
eruptions. 

Natural  brick,  which  has  been  baked  by  the  heat  of  burning  coal  mines 
that  have  smouldered  in  the  bosom  of  the  hills  during  centuries,  and 


FIG.  101.    "Masses  of  Scoria  lie  upon  the  Surface,  forming  Crags  and  Pinnacles." 
Photograph  by  Miss  Nellie  T.  Cruden. 

scoria,  which  is  melted  clay,  are  extensively  used  on  the  Northern  Pacific 
Railway  as  ballast  for  the  road-bed,  and  also  at  many  of  the  ranches  for 
making  walks  and  the  floors  of  stables. 

Six  miles  east  of  Medora  at  Scoria  the  buttes  look  as  though  they  had 
been  deluged  with  blood,  and  immense  masses  of  the  hard  scoria  lie 
upon  the  surface  crowning  the  buttes,  and  forming  huge  ragged  crags 
and  pinnacles.  Many  outcroppings  of  scoria  and  burned-clay  brick 
occur  also  south  of  Medora  in  the  buttes  along  Custer  Creek  and  other 
small  streams  entering  the  Little  Missouri  River,  shown  by  the  red 


THE   BAD   LANDS. 


183 


color  which  extends  down  over  the  lower  rock  layers,  having  washed 
from  the  red  layers  above. 

Some  Places  of  Interest. — The  Northern  Pacific  Railway  crosses  the 
Little  Missouri  River  at  Medora.  This  is  often  spoken  of  as  "the  heart 
of  the  Bad  Lands,"  though  it  is  not  in  fact  so  "bad"  here  as  at  the  point 
described  farther  down  the  river,  for,  as  the  valley  is  deeper  farther 
toward  its  mouth,  the  buttes  are  higher  and  the  chasms  deeper.  Me- 
dora is  an  interesting  spot,  and  the  traveler  who  wishes  to  see  and  study 
the  Bad  Lands  will  find  no  more  favorable  place  so  easily  accessible. 

It  was  at  Medora  that  the  French  nobleman,  the  Marquis  de 
Mores  established  his  once  famous  stockyards  and  slaughtering  houses, 
intending  to  make  this  a  shipping  point  for  dressed  beef  from  this  great 
cattle-raising  district.  The  name  Medora  was  given  to  the  town  in 
honor  of  his  wife,  who  was  an  American  lady.  The  baronial  residence, 
the  Mores  Castle,  still  stands  on  a  beautiful  bluff  overlooking  the  river 
and  the  town.  The  buildings  which  were  intended  to  be  used  for  the 
slaughtering  and  packing  industry  are  still  standing. 

About  two  miles  south  of  Medora  is  the  old  trail  by  which  the  ill- 
fated  General  Custer  led  his  army  across  the  Bad  Lands  in  the  famous 


FIG.  102.  "  Custer  Trail  Ranche  "  is  a  good  place  from  which  to  see  the  "  Bad  Lands." 
Photograph  byj.  J.  Freeman. 


184  THE   STORY   OF  THE   PRAIRIES. 

campaign  against  Sitting  Bull  in  1876.  The  buttes  on  which  the 
picket  guards  were  stationed  while  the  army  was  encamped  here  are 
pointed  out,  and  the  marks  of  the  trail  made  by  the  wagon  wheels,  and 
also  the  marks  of  the  tent-pins  at  the  camping  place,  are  still  visible. 

Custer  Trail  Ranche,  two  miles  south  of  Medora,  named  from  its 
location  on  the  line  of  the  old  Custer  trail,  is  an  unique  place,  and  worth 
the  tourists'  time  to  visit,  both  because  it  is  a  typically  ideal  ranche,  and 
because  it  is  a  good  place  from  which  to  see  the  "Bad  Lands."  The 
ranche  buildings,  mostly  made  of  logs,  constitute  a  picturesque  villa 
standing  upon  the  plain  where  Custer  Creek  enters  the  Little  Mis- 
souri, and  surrounded  by  an  amphitheater  of  buttes.  The  proprietors, 
the  Eaton  Brothers,  are  three  gentlemen,  and  tourists  will  find  here 
everything  needed  for  their  convenience  for  study  or  recreation.  A 
carload  of  saddles  and  riding  equipage,  and  all  the  things  which  go  to 
made  up  the  accessories  of  an  ideal  ranche  headquarters,  comfortable 
quarters,  good  food,  congenial  company,  in  fact,  everything  except  the 
unpurchasable  ability  to  ride  a  "broncho,"  are  at  the  service  of  guests. 
A  herd  of  riding  horses  of  all  degrees  of  docility,  from  the  wild  and 
unbridled  broncho  to  the  placid  "old  stager,"  which  is  suited  to  the 
novice,  who  may  wish  to  see  the  Bad  Lands,  are  "rounded  up"  early 
each  morning  from  a  pasture  which  is  enclosed  by  twenty-eight  miles 
of  ware  fence,  into  a  corral  built  of  logs  so  high  and  strong  that  the 
wildest  deer,  buffalo,  or  untamed  broncho  could  neither  scale  it  nor 
break  through  it. 

A  few  miles  farther  up  the  river  stands  the  log  "schack"  which  was 
once  the  headquarters  and  home  of  President  Roosevelt. 

It  has  been  stated  before  that  the  Northern  Pacific  Railway  crosses 
the  Little  Missouri  River  at  Medora.  The  railroad  descends  from  the 
divide,  or  watershed,  between  the  Heart  and  the  Little  Missouri  Rivers 
at  Fryburg,  creeping  down  the  steep  bottom  and  between  the  jagged 
sides  of  Sully's  Creek.  The  brakes  upon  the  wheels  of  the  great  roll- 
ing city  of  parlor  cars  creak  and  grind  as  the  train  follows  the  curves 
of  the  track  down  the  steep  grade  of  more  than  fifty  feet  to  the  mile. 

At  .length  the  porter  calls  out  the  poetic  name  of  Medora.  Step- 
ping upon  the  platform  of  the  little  station  the  great  nearly  perpendicu- 
lar wall  of  a  large  butte  meets  the  gaze,  its  ribbon-marked  side  standing 
like  a  great  curtain  300  feet  high  behind  the  town.  The  top  of  the 
butte  appears  to  be  perfectly  flat,  as  though  the  upper  part  of  a  great 
mountain  had  been  sawed  off  and  taken  away  and  this  great  massive 


..  .  .  •  *    /.^•^••••^•••••i&:.  ..-.-  .*       -  *  . 
FIG.  103.     The  Bad  Lands,  Little  Missouri  Valley. 


FIG.  104.     "The  Palisades,"  Medora,  Billings  County. 
185 


186  THE    STORY    OF    THE    PRAIRIES. 

base  left.  The  ribbon-like  marks  across  the  steep  side  are  the  hori- 
zontal layers  of  the  outcropping  clay,  sandstone,  shales,  and  coal,  of 
which  the  butte  is  composed. 

After  crossing  the  river  the  railroad  suddenly  bends  northward  or 
down  the  river,  hugging  closely  against  the  bank  at  the  foot  of  the 
overhanging  buttes  till  the  mouth  of  a  coulee  is  reached,  when  it  winds 
its  laborious  way  up  the  steep  path  of  the  coulee  to  the  prairie  beyond 
the  Bad  Lands,  that  is,  to  the  level  of  the  tops  of  the  buttes  at  Meclora. 

A  View  from  the  Top — If  the  tourist  secures  a  saddle-horse, — and 
there  is  nothing  else,  for  there  is  little  use  in  this  country  for  wheeled 
vehicles, — he  may  go  by  a  winding  course  around  to  the  top  of  a  butte. 
There  he  finds  a  level  grass-covered  prairie,  as  fine  a  field  for  a  base- 
ball ground  as  college  student  could  desire.  Away  down  there  in 
the  valley — not  away  off  there  but  away  down  there — is  the  muddy 
Little  Missouri,  houses,  the  railroad,  the  bridge!  He  is  now  on  the 
top  of  the  same  butte  which  was  first  seen  from  the  depot  platform. 
Now  he  is  looking  clown  the  face  of  the  same  wall  from  the  upper  edge, 
and  not  looking  against  it  from  near  its  base. 

Look  off  toward  the  horizon  and  the  scene  is  that  of  a  great  prairie 
cut  up  by  little  grooves  or  scratches,  for.  the  eye  cannot  see  down  into 
the  valleys,  and  only  the  edges  of  the  flat  tops  of  the  buttes  tell  where 
the  valleys  are.  The  other  buttes  are  like  this  one,  they  are  all  little 
segments  or  blocks  of  prairie  separated  by  deep  and  jagged  valleys. 
Looking  away  across  the  distant  landscape  there  spreads  out  over  the 
tops  of  the  buttes  the  vast  prairie,  the  great  Plateau  which  embraces 
all  of  western  North  Dakota  and  extends  west  to  the  Rocky  Moun- 
tains. But  look  at  the  nearer  landscape  and  it  is  deeply  cut  up  by 
valleys.  Go  down  into*  a  valley  and  the  traveler  is  lost  to  the  world. 
He  sees  only  the  edges  of  the  little  prairies  which  are  on  the  tops  of  the 
buttes.  It  is  not  the  butte  tops  which  are  high,  it  is  the  valley  bot- 
toms which  are  low.  They  have  been  sunken  down  into  the  earth. 
They  are  furrows  or  troughs  cut  deeply  into  the  bosom  of  the  prairie. 

Let  us  look  off  once  more  to  the  far  distant  horizon.  Away  to  the 
south  rises  a  huge  dark  mass  higher  than  the  general  level.  To  the 
southwest  is  another  dark  mass,  and  against  the  western  sky  two  other 
great  blocks  can  be  seen  above  the  general  horizon.  These  are  higher 
buttes,  buttes  standing  on  the  shoulders  of  buttes,  as  it  were.  They  are 
so  far  away  that  they  do  not  appear  so  very  high  upon  the  horizon,  but 
when  we  approach  nearer  to  them  they  are  seen  to  stand  400  to  600 


THE  BAD  LANDS.  187 

feet  above  the  surrounding  landscape,  that  is,  higher  than  the  tops  of 
the  buttes  on  the  shoulders  of  which  they  stand. 

On  the  Map  of  the  State  (Figure  i)  it  will  be  noticed  that  there 
are  buttes  or  hills  scattered  over  the  southwestern  portion  of  the  State. 
These  are  higher  buttes  standing  considerably  above  all  the  surround- 
ing landscape.  The  Killdeer  Mountains,  forty  miles  north  of  Dickin- 
son, are  high  buttes  of  this  class.  They  are  more  than  700  feet  above 
the  surrounding  prairie,  their  sides  steep  and  ruffled  with  crags,  their 
top  a  broad  level  meadow. 

These  higher  buttes,  the  Killdeer  Mountains,  Camel's  Hump,  Sen- 
tinel Butte,  Square  ButteT  Round  Butte,  and  the  many  in  the  south- 
western corner  of  the  State  which  are  higher  than  the  surrounding 
landscape,  tell  an  important  story  of  the  history  of  this  region.  West- 
ward in  Montana  are  many  such  high  buttes.  The  story  in  brief  is 
that  the  whole  vast  region  extending  west  to  the  Rocky  Mountains 
was  once  lower  than  it  is  now,  that  is,  its  elevation  above  sea-level  was 
not  as  great.  The  land  had  been  worn  away  by  erosion  till  there  were 
left  only  scattered  patches  of  upland.  The  region  had  all  been  reduced 
to  base-level  except  these  few  remaining  parts. 

"Base-level"  means  that  the  general  level  of  the  landscape  has  been 
lowered  by  the  streams  till  it  is  so  little  above  sea-level  that  erosion 
has  practically  ceased.  The  high  hills,  these  highest  buttes,  are,  there- 
fore, vestiges  of  a  former  landscape,  higher  places  which  were  not  worn 
away,  just  as  the  Turtle  Mountain  Plateau  was  left  during  the  long  ages 
preceding  the  Glacial  Period  as  a  fragment  of  an  older  landscape  which 
was  nearly  all  carried  away.  The  general  level  of  the  tops  of  the  buttes 
in  the  Bad  Lands  is  the  old  base-leveled  plain,  such  a  plain  as  was  the 
great  region  of  the  Mouse  Valley,  and  the  central  part  of  the  State 
which  is  now  crossed  by  the  James  and  Sheyenne  Rivers,-  before  the  ice- 
sheet  swept  over  the  landscape. 

Now,  this  whole  region  was  uplifted.  This  is  what  is  called  an 
epeirogenic  movement  of  the  crust  of  the  earth.  When  the  uplifting  of 
this  region  occurred  erosion  began  actively  again,  and  then  began  to  be 
formed  the  coulees  by  which  the  Bad  Lands  are  dissected  into  buttes. 
All  the  "Bad  Lands"  along  the  Little  Missouri  River,  therefore  are  the 
result  of  erosion  since  the  region  was  uplifted.  It  is  this  uplift  which 
gives  the  steep  gradient  to  the  Little  Missouri  and  so  makes  the  deep 
cutting  of  its  channel  and  those  of  its  tributaries  possible. 

Thus  the  Bad  Lands  are  a  new  feature.     They  represent  the  "sec- 


188  THE   STORY   OF   THE    PRAIRIES. 

ond  childhood,"  or  a  beginning  of  the  development  of  a  new  land- 
scape from  one  which  had  become  old.  They  have  not  always  been 
"Bad  Lands  to  Travel  Through!"  The  region  was  once  a  great  broad 
prairie  lowland.  The  level  meadows  which  are  now  left  in  patches  on 
the  tops -of  the  buttes  are  fragments  of  the  old  base-leveled  plain  of  a 
former  time. 

It  should  be  said  that  the  "Bad  Lands"  are  not  really  so  bad  after 
all.  They  are,  indeed,  "bad  to  travel  through,"  but  it  would  be  diffi- 
cult to  convince  the  ranchmen  who  have  become  wealthy  grazing  herds 
of  cattle  and  horses  here  that  they  are  "b^d."  They  claim  that  these 
lands  are  better  for  grazing,  area  for  area,  than  the  smooth  and  un- 
broken prairie.  The  coulee  bottoms  yield  excellent  pasturage,  for 
here  the  grass  grows  abundantly,  and  the  deep  valleys  furnish  protec- 
tion for  the  animals  in  winter,  and  the  snows  which  gather  in  the  win- 
ter protect  the  grass  so  that  more  grows  than  there  are  cattle  enough 
to  eat.  The  burning  coal  mines  also  have  their  advantage,  for  these 
act  as  great  furnaces  warming  the  air  near  by  them,  and  the  cattle 
congregate  about  them  in  the  cold  weather  to  enjoy  the  warmth. 

The  Petrified  Forests — Another  chapter  in  the  history  of  the  past  is 
revealed  in  the  "Petrified  Forests,"  the  remains  of  which  are  scattered 
over  the  landscape,  or  still  stand  as  stumps  in  the  places  where  they 
grew.  Huge  logs,  looking  so  much  like  natural  wood  as  to  be  easily 
mistaken  for  it,  occur  in  great  numbers.  Many  stumps  still  stand  with 
their  "roots"  buried  in  the  earth  just  where  they  grew. 

We  have  seen  before  that  beds  of  lignite  coal  occur  in  the  rocks  of 
the  region.  These  were  formed  from  the  forests  which  grew  during 
the  times  when  these  rocks  were  being  formed.  The  "petrified  for- 
ests" are  trees  which  grew  upon  the  landscape  but  which  were  not 
buried  under  such  conditions  as  to  form  coal.  They  have  become 
"petrified,"  or  "stone  trees." 

When  a  tree  dies  in  the  forest,  but  remains  standing,  it  does  not 
become  dry  or  "seasoned,"  but  takes  up  water  from  the  ground  and 
becomes  "sap-soaked."  Such  trees  dry  out  by  the  action  of  the  sun 
and  wind,  as  do  all  trees,  but  they  continually  take  up  more  water  from 
the  earth  and  so  do  not  become  dry  or  seasoned.  The  water  which 
was  taken  up  by  the  trees  which  become  "petrified  trees"  contained 
mineral  matter  in  solution.  This  mineral  matter  cannot  evaporate 
from  the  tree  with  the  water  and  so  it  is  left  behind  in  the  pores  or 
cavities  of  the  wood.  As  this  process  went  on  for  a  long  time  the  tree 


THE  BAD  LANDS.  189 

trunk,  and  sometimes  the  larger  limbs  also,  became  slowly  filled  with 
the  mineral  matter.  Logs  which  lay  upon  the  ground  or  became  bu- 
ried in  the  soil  absorbed  water  which  contained  mineral  matter,  and 
these  became  "petrified"  also. 

The  wood  did  not  change  into  stone;  this  is  not  what  is  meant 
when  it  is  said  that  the  trees  became  "stone  trees"  or  the  log  became 
a  "petrified  log."  The  wood  decayed  and  particles  of  mineral  matter 
were  left  in  place  of  the  wood,  and  so  the  tree  trunk  or  log  came  to  be 
replaced  by  stone  having  exactly  the  form  and  the  structure  of  the 
original  tree  trunk  or  log.  It  thus  happens  that  a  log  or  piece  of  "pet- 
rified wood"  can  sometimes  hardly  be  told  from  actual  wood  till  it  is 
examined  closely.  It  is  no  joke  that  travelers  on  the  western  plains 
where  no  trees  now  grow,  have  been  deceived  by  the  petrified  logs  into 
thinking  that  they  had  found  fuel ;  for  such  logs,  falling  to  pieces  under 
the  action  of  frost  and  sun,  so  closely  resemble  slivers  and  pieces  of  a 
log  of  wood  that  only  handling  shows  them  to  be  stone. 

When  a  block  of  petrified  wood  has  been  polished,  or  when  a  thin 
slice  is  examined  with  a  microscope,  the  grain  of  the  wood  or  the  cell- 
structure  can  be  seen  just  as  it  was  in  the  original  tree.  In  this  way 
it  is  possible  to  tell  what  kinds  of  trees  grew  on  the  landscape  long  ages 
ago.  And  in  the  same  way  the  kinds  of  trees  which  make  up  the  coal 
in  the  coal  beds  can  be  found  out. 


CHAPTER  THE  NINETEENTH. 
THE  COAL  BEDS  OF  NORTH   DAKOTA. 

The  Early  Landscape. — One  of  the  great  sources  of  wealth  with  which 
North  Dakota  has  been  endowed  by  Nature  lies  beneath  the  surface,  and 
so  is  not  exactly  a  landscape  feature,  yet  it  is  so  directly  related  to  the 
landscape,  and  to  the  resources  which  belong  to  the  surface,  that  it  can 
hardly  be  omitted  from  a  study  of  the  landscape  geology  of  the  State. 
Its  bearing  upon  the  development  of  the  wealth  of  the  soil  is  so  direct  that 
it  becomes  a  part  of  our  subject.  This  is  the  great  wealth  of  coal  which 
lies  buried  beneath  the  surface  of  the  western  half  of  the  State. 

To  understand  the  formation  of  the  great  deposits  of  coal  we  need 
to  go  back  to  an  earlier  chapter  in  the  story  of  the  rock  formations  of 
our  State,  to  a  time  long  before  the  present  landscape  was  formed,  and 
before  the  landscape  which  has  been  called  "Old  North  Dakota,"  or 
the  pre-glacial  landscape,  was  formed,  back  to  a  period  whose  history 
is  only  known  to  us  through  the  rocks  which  were  then  deposited.  In 
fact  the  "date"  of  the  history  we  now  study  goes  away  back  to  the  great 
Middle  Time  of  the  progress  of  the  North  American  Continent,  and 
of  the  World,  to  a  time  when  a  great  Inland  Sea  or  arm  of  the  ocean 
covered  nearly  half  of  the  continent,  and  the  rocks  which  are  now  the 
shales  and  sandstones  underlying  the  drift  formations  were  being  de- 
posited. This  is  the  period  in  the  earth's  history  known  as  the  Creta- 
ceous Era,  the  closing  part  of  the  great  Mesozoic,  or  Middle  Life, 
Period  of  the  earth's  history,  known  also  as  the  Age  of  Reptiles. 

The  beginning  of  the  landscape  of  North  Dakota,  as  of  all  land- 
scapes, was  beneath  the  sea.  The  continents  were  first  sea-bottoms 
and  afterward  became  the  dry  land.  The  rock  layers  which  are  passed 
through  in  drilling  an  artesian  well  are  the  old  mud-floors  of  the  ancient 
oceans,  and  the  different  kinds  of  rock  in  these  layers  and  the  plant  and 
animal  remains  they  contain  tell  the  history  of  the  time  in  which  they 
were  formed.  The  Map,  Figure  112,  shows  the  portion  of  North 


190 


THE  COAL  BEDS  OF  NORTH  DAKOTA. 


191 


OS    <S 
O    v» 

"   S 


If 

a  § 
ca  ^j 
2^ 


192 


THE    STORY    OF   THE    PRAIRIES. 


America  in  which  North  Dakota  is  embraced,  and  the  shaded  parts  show 
the  regions  covered  by  the  sea  during  the  Cretaceous  Era. 

The  sea  was  shallow  and  the  crust  of  the  earth  underneath,  as  also 
the  land  areas  of  the  continent,  rose  and  sank.  When  an  uplifting  of 
the  region  of  the  sea  occurred  the  waters  withdrew  and  the  mud  at  the 
bottom  became  the  soil  in  which  great  forests  grew.  When  the  region 
sank  again  these  forests  were  submerged  and  were  in  turn  buried  in  the 
sediments  deposited  over  them.  It  is  to  this  rising  and  sinking  of  the 
crust  of  the  earth,  the  elevation  and  subsidence  of  large  areas,  that  we 
owe  the  fact  of  our  great  coal  beds.  When  a  region  was  elevated  a 
little  above  the  level  of  the  sea  this  then  became  a  great  marsh,  or  moist 
lowland,  and  trees  grew  rapidly,  forming  dense  forests.  Then  when 
the  region  became  low  enough  so  that  the  sea  covered  it  again  muds 
were  deposited  on  top  of  the  fallen  trees  and  vegetable  matter.  In 
the  clay-beds  under  the  coal  are  sometimes  found  the  stumps  of  trees 
standing  apparently  where  they  grew,  and  the  trunks  from  such  stumps 
have  been  found  above  in  the  coal  seam  as  coal,  though  still  in  the  form 
of  the  original  tree  trunk. 

The  fossil  stumps  of  trees  have  been  found  in  the  rocks  of  the  coal 
formations  of  Pennsylvania  in  the  clay  under  the  coal,  their  trunks 
running  into  the  coal  bed  where  this  part  has  been  formed  into  coal, 
and  the  top  extending  up  into  the  rocks  over  the  coal  as  fossil  or  "pet- 


FlG.  106.  Old  Sims  Mining  Company's  Mine.     A— Clay  and  gravel.     B— Thin  layer  of  coal.    C— Clay 

and  gravel.     D— Coal,  one-half  foot  thick.     Probably  30  feet  above  the  thick  layer  I.    E— Clay. 

F— Coal,  about  one  foot  thick.     Probably  10  feet  above  the  thick  layer  I.      G— Sand  and 

clay.     H — Compact  clay.    I— Thick  layer  of  coal — the  one  worked. 

State  Geological  Survey  of  North  Dakota, 

rifled"  wood.  In  the  clays  or  rocks  which  are  under  and  over  the  coal 
beds  logs  and  leaves  of  fern  plants  such  as  grew  during  that  time  are 
sometimes  found  in  such  abundance  as  to  make  up  a  large  part  of  the 
mass  of  the  rock. 

The  coal  beds  of  North  Dakota  have  a  layer  of  clay  below,  and  very 


THE  COAL  BEDS  OF  NORTH  DAKOTA.  193 

commonly  one  above  also.  These  clays  are  often  called  fire-clays,  be- 
cause some  of  them  are  valuable  for  pottery  and  earthenware,  and  the 
manufacture  of  fire-brick. 

How  the  Coal  Beds  Were  Formed.— When  the  sea  covered  any  part 
of  the  earth  this  region  received  deposits  of  mud  and  other  sediments. 
If  the  lands  next  to  the  sea  were  not  very  high  the  streams  flowing 
from  them  would  not  carry  very  coarse  materials  to  the  sea.  Clay  and 
shale  are  composed  of  very  fine  sediments.  The  waves  of  the  sea 
caused  by  the  winds  and  the  tides  would  wear  the  bottom  and  shores, 
and  the  materials  so  worn  would  become  spread  over  the  sea-bottom 
as  sandstones.  The  finer  materials  brought  in  by  the  rivers  and  the 
finest  parts,  worn  by  the  waves,  would  be  carried  farther  out  and  depos- 
ited as  clay  or  shale. 

Now  the  changes  from  below  sea-level  to  above  sea-level,  or  the 
changes  by  which  the  land  became  covered  by  the  sea,  or  the  sea-bot- 
tom was  lifted  up  so  as  to  become  dry  land,  went  on  very  slowly.  A 
change  of  a  few  inches  may  have  occupied  hundreds  of  years.  When 
the  region  became  j.ust  a  little  above  the  level  of  the  sea  and  was  cov- 
ered with  a  forest  of  trees  together  with  a  great  variety  of  smaller 
plants,  we  should  think  of  these  growing  and  shedding  their  leaves 
season  after  season,  some  of  them  falling  over  by  storms  and  their 
trunks  becoming  covered  with  leaves  and  debris,  and  this  as  going 
on  for  a  very  great  length  of  time,  as  we  measure  time  in  years.  But 
if  during  all  this  time  the  land  was  sinking  slowly,  so  slowly  that  the 
tree  trunks  and  leaves  added  to  the  land  just  about  as  fast  as  it  sank, 
and  the  soaking  of  these  with  water  prevented  them  from  decaying, 
then  after  a  great  lapse  of  time  there  would  be  a  layer  of  vegetable 
matter  of  considerable  thickness  all  over  this  region,  a  layer  of  tree 
trunks,  stems,  and  leaves.  If  in  time  the  sea  crept  in  and  covered  this 
region  again,  that  is,  if  the  sinking  down,  or  subsidence,  became  great 
enough  so  that  the  sea  came  in  and  covered  it,  and  streams  from  the  ad- 
joining lands  brought  their  waters  and  sediments  into  it,  then  all  this 
accumulation  of  vegetable  material  would  be  covered  with  mud  or 
sediments.  It  might  be  covered  with  such  sediments  as  form  clay  or 
shale,  and  the  waves  and  currents  might  wash  in  more  sandy  materials 
forming  a  sandstone  deposit.  Coal  beds  are  found  to  be  made  up  of 
vegetable  matter  such  as  we  have  imagined  in  the  case  just  described. 
Logs  and  stumps  and  leaves  are  found  in  the  coal  beds,  changed  from 
wood  into  coal;  and  pieces  of  coal  which  show  no  likeness  to  wood  to 


194  THE    STORY    OF   THE    PRAIRIES. 

the  naked  eye,  when  viewed  with  a  microscope  in  very  thin  sections, 
show  the  structure  of  wood. 

How  the  Wood  Was  Changed  into  Coal — We  shall  now  try  to  see  how, 
in  the  long  lapse  of  ages  since  it  was  covered  by  the  mud  and  water, 
the  accumulation  of  vegetable  matter  became  changed  into  a  coal  bed. 

Wood  is  composed  principally  of  three  substances,  known  as  ele- 
ments, and  it  may  help  us  to  better  understand  coal  if  we  remember 
their  names.  They  are  Carbon,  Hydrogen,  and  Oxygen.  When  wood 
is  burned,  or  when  it  rots  in  the  forest,  the  elements  of  which  it  is  com- 
posed are  separated,  or,  as  the  chemist  would  say,  it  is  decomposed. 
When  it  is  burned  in  our  stoves  the  hydrogen  and  oxygen  are  sepa- 
rated from  the  carbon,  and  the  former  go  up  the  chimney  as  water  in 
the  form  of  steam.  This  is  a  part  of  the  "smoke."  Oxygen  from  the 
air  combines  with  the  carbon  and  forms  what  is  known  as  carbonic  acid 
gas.  This  gas  goes  up  the  chimney  also  as  smoke. 

When  a  tree  decays  in  the  forest  it  "burns  up"  in  the  same  way  as 
in  the  stove  except  that  the  process  is  very  slow.  But  the  same 
amount  of  heat  is  given  off,  and  the  water  and  carbonic  acid  gas  are 
formed  by  this  slow  burning,  just  as  in  the  stove,  the  gases  escaping 
into  the  air.  But  when  wood  is  buried  under  a  great  weight  of  mud 
and  water  it  is  kept  from  decaying  or  burning  up  the  way  it  would  if  it 
were  lying  on  the  top  of  the  ground.  It  is  in  this  condition  of  being 
entombed  deep  under  the  water  and  mud,  shut  away  from  the  air, 
under  the  pressure  of  the  overlying  mud  (which  in  time  has  become 
hardened  into  solid  rock),  and  heated  by  the  heat  from  the  depths  of  the 
earth,  that  the  wood  becomes  transformed  into  coal. 

By  a  slow  process  the  hydrogen  and  oxygen  are  driven  off  from  the 
wood  leaving  most  of  the  carbon.  This  carbon  is  the  coal  which  wre 
obtain  from  the  mines.  Not  that  all  of  the  hydrogen  and  oxygen  are 
driven  off  and  all  the  carbon  is  left,  for  this  is  not  exactly  the  case. 
Some  of  the  carbon  is  driven  off  in  combination  with  some  of  the  hyd- 
rogen, in  the  form  of  oils  or  gases,  but  the  carbon  which  remains  is  the 
black  coal.  Petroleum  or  "coal-oil,"  from  which  kerosene  and  gaso- 
line are  obtained,  is  carbon  and  hydrogen  which  have  been  driven  off 
under  similar  conditions  from  animal  remains  entombed  in  the  rocks. 

The  Different  Kinds  of  Coal — Different  kinds  of  coal  are  formed  ac- 
cording to  the  conditions  under  which  the  wood  is  changed.  In  the 
purest  and  hardest  anthracite  coal  all  the  hydrogen  and  oxygen  have 
been  driven  off  and  there  is  left  the  pure  carbon,  except  such  "impuri- 


THE  COAL  BEDS  OF  NORTH  DAKOTA.  195 

ties"  as  were  in  the  wood  in  the  form  of  mineral  substances,  for  there 
is  some  mineral  in  wood  which  forms  the  "ashes"  when  wood  is  burned 
in  the  stove.  Bituminous  coal,  or  "soft  coal,"  such  as  is  used  in  steam 
engines  and  in  blacksmith  shops,  contains  a  good  deal  of  hydrogen  in 
combination  with  carbon  in  the  form  of  oils.  This  is  what  makes  it 
so  "dirty"  to  handle  and  causes  the  black  sooty  smoke  in  burning. 
Lignite  coal  (from  Lignum,  meaning  wood)  is  a  good  deal  more  like 
the  original  wood.  It  has  been  changed  much  less  than  has  bituminous 
coal,  and  peat  has  been  changed  still  less. 

There  are  all  stages  or  degrees  in  the  process  of  change  in  the  coals 
found  in  the  different  parts  of  the  world.  Peat  is  dead  vegetable  mat- 
ter which  has  become  water-soaked  and  buried  away  from  the  air  at  the 
bottom  of  a  slough  or  "bog."  Lignite  may  be  so  little  changed  that 
fibers  of  the  wood  can  still  be  seen,  and  knots  and  branches  remain  in 
the  form  in  which  they  grew.  There  is  also  lignite  which  is  more  like 
bituminous  coal,  more  oily,  and  not  showing  very  clear  traces  of  the 
woody  fiber.  Bituminous,  or  soft  coals,  have  many  degrees  o-f  "soft- 
ness," that  is,  some  contain  more  and  some  less  of  the  volatile  oils  of 
carbon  and  hydrogen.  (Volatile  means  flying  away,  because  these  oils 
quickly  pass  off  in  the  form  of  gas  when  heated.)  Those  which  con- 
tain less  oil  are  more  like  anthracite,  and  so  also  there  are  grades  of 
anthracite  ranging  all  the  w^ay  from  the  harder  bituminous  grades, 
which  contain  a  little  oil,  to  the  hardest  "diamond  anthracite,"  which 
is  nearly  pure  carbon. 

The  essential  difference,  therefore,  between  the  various  grades  of 
lignite,  bituminous,  and  anthracite  coal  lies  in  the  extent  to  which  the 
processes  of  change  by  which  the  volatile  oils  have  been  driven  off  have 
gone.  Peat  might  be  transformed  into  lignite,  lignite  into  bituminous, 
and  bituminous  into  anthracite,  if  the  proper  conditions  of  heat  and 
pressure,  away  from  air,  could  be  supplied.  The  anthracite  coal  de- 
posits are  in  the  regions  wrhere  mountain  upheavals  have  occurred. 
The  heat,  which  attends  the  upheaval  of  mountains,  produces  the 
change  in  the  coal  which  is  deeply  buried  beneath  a  great  weight  of  over- 
lying rocks.  There  is  no  anthracite  coal  in  North  Dakota  because  no 
mountain-making  upheavals  have  occurred  within  the  region  of  this 
State. 

Thus  we  see  that  there  is  a  long  series  of  varieties,  or  kinds,  of  coal, 
all  formed  from  vegetable  matter  which  has  been  changed  from  its 
original  condition  as  wood  by  a  slow  transforming  process  of  decompo- 


196 


THE    STORY    OF   THE    PRAIRIES. 


sition  under  heat  and  pressure,  and  sealed  up  from  the  air.  The  wood\ 
stems  and  leaves  falling  upon  the  ground  and  becoming  water-soaked, 
or  carried  upon  ponds  as  "floating  islands"  and  finally  sinking  as  peat 
in  bogs,  forests  building  up  accumulations  of  trunks  and  twigs  many 
feet  in  thickness  over  the  surface  of  the  low  marshy  ground,  these  are 
the  beginnings  of  the  long  series  of  coal  formations  in  which  North 
Dakota  lignite  represents  one  of  the  stages,  and  following  this  the 
many  varieties  of  bituminous  coal  which  include  all  degrees  from  the 
higher  grades  of  lignite  to  bituminous  and  semi-bituminous,  and  the 
lower  grades  of  anthracite,  and  finally  the  hardest  diamond  anthracite. 
The  "Western  Coal  Measures."— The  rock  formations  in  which  the 
great  western  coal  fields  of  North  Dakota,  South  Dakota,  Montana, 


FIG.  107.   An  Outcropping  of  Coal  on  the  Missouri  River. 
State  Geological  Survey  of  Nortli  Dakota. 

Wyoming,  and  Colorado  occur  have  been  called  the  "Western  Coal 
Measures"  to  distinguish  them  from  the  older  "Coal  Measures"  of 
Pennsylvania  and  the  eastern  states,  which  belong  to  an  earlier  Time 
in  Geological  History.  The  rocks  in  which  the  western  coal  deposits 
occur  belong  mostly  to  the  Cretaceous  Era,  whereas  the  eastern  coal 
fields  belong  in  the  rock  formations  of  the  Carboniferous  Era. 

There  is  some  question  whether  the  North  Dakota  coal  beds  are 
buried  in  rocks  which  were  deposited  during  the  closing  portion  of  the 
Cretaceous  Era,  the  Age  of  Reptiles,  or  whether  they  belong  to  the 
earlier  part  of  the  next  later  era,  the  Tertiary,  or  Age  of  Mammals. 
The  rocks  are  known  as  the  Laramie  Formation,  and  this  is  generally 
considered  to  belong  with  the  Cretaceous,  though  the  Laramie  Forma- 


THE  COAL  BEDS  OF  NORTH  DAKOTA.  197 

tion  seems  to  mark  the  transition,  or  crossing  overr  between  the  Creta- 
ceous and  the  Tertiary  Eras. 

The  highland  in  the  western  part  of  the  State,  the  great  Missouri 
Plateau,  the  Coteau  du  Missouri,  embracing  the  western  one-third  of 
the  State,  is  composed  of  the  strata  or  rock  layers  of  the  Laramie  group. 
Just  how  far  these  rocks  extend  east  of  the  foot  of  the  great  plateau 
front  into  the  basin  of  the  James  River  we  do  not  know  with  certainty, 
for  they  are  mostly  covered  with  drift  so  as  not  to  be  easily  seen,  but 
they  probably  extend  east  nearly  to  a  line  dividing  the  State  into  east  and 
west  halves. 

Coal  beds  which  are  profitable  for  mining  occur  in  the  Turtle  Moun- 
tains, and  very  extensive  mines  are  worked  on  the  upper  Mouse  River 
at  Burlington  and  on  the  Des  Lacs  River  at  Kenmare,  in  the  great 
valley  which  lies  between  the  Turtle  Mountains  and  the  eastern  edge 
of  the  Missouri  Plateau.  The  Mouse  and  Des  Lacs  Valleys  are  cut 
down  considerably  below  the  drift,  and  the  tunnels  to  the  mines  are 
made  from  the  hillsides  along  the  valleys. 

The  occurrence  of  mines  in  these  valleys  would  seem  to  show  that 
the  "Coal  Measures"  extend  across  the  broad  valley  from  the  Missouri 
Plateau  to  the  Turtle  Mountains.  The  opening  of  profitable  mines 
near  Harvey,  in  Wells  county,  indicates  that  the  rocks  in  which  the 
coal  beds  occur  extend  as  far  east  as  the  upper  James  River. 

Lignite  coal  has  been  found  in  some  of  the  lower  groups  of  rocks 
of  the  Cretaceous.  The  Fort  Benton  formation  has  furnished  coal  in 
some  of  the  states  farther  west,  but  this  formation  is  deeply  buried  in 
North  Dakota.  The  formations  lying  next  above  the  Fort  Benton  and 
below  the  Laramie,  are  the  Niobrara,  the  Fort  Pierre,  and  the  Fox  Hills. 
These  formations  are  marine  or  sea-bottom  formations,  for  fossils  of 
sea-animals  are  found  in  the  rocks.  It  seems,  therefore,  that  North 
Dakota  was  covered  by  water  too  deep  for  the  formation  of  coal  beds 
from  the  accumulation  of  vegetable  matter  during  the  time  these  rocks 
were  being  deposited. 

The  Laramie  rocks  at  the  top  of  the  Cretaceous  series  are  mostly 
fresh  water  formations,  with  beds  of  coal,  formed  when  North  Dakota, 
or  at  least  its  western  half,  was  just  emerging  from  its  long  burial  un- 
der the  sea  during  the  time  in  which  the  marine,  or  salt-sea  forma- 
tions, the  Fort  Benton,  the  Niobrara,  the  Fort  Pierre,  and  the  Fox 
Hills,  were  being  formed.  The  beds  of  coal  were  formed  when  the 
land  was  being  alternately  lifted  a  little  above  and  then  sinking  a  little 


198 


THE    STORY    OF    THE    PRAIRIES. 


THE  COAL  BEDS  OF  NORTH  DAKOTA. 


199 


below  sea-level.  The  conditions  for  the  gathering"  of  thick  layers  of 
wood,  and  leaves,  and  stems  of  small  plants,  were  favorable  during"  the 
Laramie  epoch  (an  epoch  is  the  time  during  which  a  formation  is  being 
deposited).  The  marshes  remained  marshes  for  a  long  time,  and  the 
peat-bogs  continued  to  gather  woody  materials  during  long  periods, 
before  being  buried  beneath  sediments.  The  gathering  of  the  woody 
matter  in  broad  shallow  lakes,  forming  peat-bogs,  explains  why  beds 
of  coal  are  often  not  continuous  for  long  distances,  but  occur  in  beds 
which  are  thicker  toward  the  center  and  thin  out  toward  the  edges. 


F  -- 


FIG.  iog.  Mouse  River  Lignite  Coal  Company's  Mine.    A— Prairie  boulders,  sand  and  yellow  clay,  30  to 

60  feet.    B — Coal,  one  foot.    C — Sand  and  clay,  D — Sandstone,  E — Sand  and  clay,  about  20 

teet.    F — Coal,  one  and  one-half  feet.     G — Sand  and  yellow  clay,  about  15  feet. 

H — Gray  clay,  20  feet.    I — Blue  clay,  13  feet.    J — Coal,  10  feet. 

State  Geological  Survey  of  North  Dakota. 


This  also  explains  why  there  may  not  be  the  same  series  of  coal 
beds  one  above  another  in  different  regions.  The  beds  run  out  hori- 
zontally, and  so  there  may  be  more  or  fewer  seams  or  beds  in  a  vertical 
section  in  one  place  than  another.  It  explains  also  why  there  may  be 
differences  in  the  quality  of  coal  from  different  sections,  and  from  dif- 
ferent seams,  or  beds,  in  the  same  section.  It  would  seem  likely  that 


200 


THE    STORY    OF   THE    PRAIRIES. 


not  only  higher  and  lower  beds  would  be  struck  in  different  parts  of 
the  State,  as  well  as  in  the  same  section,  but  different  beds  might  be  at 
nearly  or  quite  the  same  level,  though  many  miles  apart.  Fifteen  to 
twenty  seams  or  beds  varying  from  an  inch  to  twenty-six  feet  in  thick- 
ness have  been  found  to  occur  in  a  vertical  distance  of  1,000  feet  in 
this  formation  in  the  states  farther  west.  The  thickness  of  the  Laramie 
formation  is  much  greater  farther  west  than  in  North  Dakota,  but  it 
is  estimated  to  be  about  1,000  feet  in  thickness  in  this  State. 

Sections  showing  the  coal  beds  and  rock  layers  above  and  below 
at  several  mines  are  given  in  the  accompanying  figures. 


A 

B 

C 

D 

E 
F 

G 


FlG.  no.  Section  at  Lehigh  Mine.      A — About  25    feet    clay  and  gravel.       B — About  one   foot  coal, 

C — About  25  feet,  clay,   etc.      D — About  two  feet    coal.      E — About  30  feet  clay,  etc. 

F — About  three  to  five  feet  compact  (gray)  clay.     G  —  About  10  to  15  feet  coal. 

State  Geological  Survey  of  North  Dakota. 


The  following  table  shows  the  elevations  above  sea-level  of  railroad 
stations  nearest  to  several  mines  in  different  parts  of  the  State,  These 
figures  do  not  show  the  exact  elevations  of  the  coal  beds,  but  they  give 
some  suggestions  of  the  vertical  range  of  the  coal  beds  of  the  State. 
The  openings  leading  into  the  mines  are  in  most  cases  near  the  stations. 


THE  COAL  BEDS  OF  NORTH  DAKOTA.  201 

Elevations  Above 
Stations.  Sea-Level. 

Harvey    i  ,596  feet. 

Davis  (near  Minot) !>573  " 

Burlington 1,590  " 

Kenmare    I>799  " 

Williston    1,859  " 

Bismarck    1,668  " 

Wilton 2,158  " 

Sims    T»958  " 

Lehigh  (near  Dickinson) 2,342  " 

The  accompanying  Map  of  the  State  shows  the  area  where  coal  has 
been  mined,  and  where  there  is  not  much  doubt  but  that  it  can  be  found 
wherever  ?.  stream  cuts  deeply  into  the  rock  layers,  or  wherever  a  shaft 
may  be  sunk. 

In  the  Bad  Lands — In  the  Bad  Lands  where  the  streams  have  cut 
deeply  into  the  strata,  coal  beds  are  frequently  seen  in  the  sides  of  the 
buttes.  They  range  in  thickness  from  an  inch  or  less  to  six  or  eight 
feet,  or  even  more.  It  is  a  common  thing  for  the  ranchmen  in  this 
part  of  the  State  to  have  coal  mines  on  their  own  lands  or  within  short 
distances  of  their  houses,  so  that  they  haul  their  fuel  supply  directly 
from  the  mines,  shoveling  it  at  first  hand  into  wagons,  just  as  in  the 
eastern  states  farmers  go  to  the  woodlands  on  their  own  farms  for  loads 
of  wood.  Sometimes  a  coal  bed  is  cut  across  by  a  small  stream  on  the 
bank  of  which  stands  the  house,  so  that  coal  is  brought  directly  from 
the  mine  in  the  coal-pail  and  put  into  the  stove!  The  writer  has 
stopped  at  a  ranche  for  dinner  while  traveling  in  this  part  of  the  State, 
and  when  fuel  was  wanted  for  the  kitchen  stove  a  small  boy  was  de- 
spatched to  the  coal  mine  in  the  back  yard  to  get  the  coal!  It  is  not  a 
joke  that  in  digging  a  cellar  for  a  house  a  coal  bed  may  be  dug  into 
only  a  little  below  the  surface,  so  that  in  the  winter  the  owner  of  the 
house  may  go  to  the  coal  mine  after  a  scuttle  of  coal  without  even 
going  out  of  his  own  house! 

A  point  of  advantage  the  western  farmer  has  over  his  eastern  cousin 
lies  in  the  fact  that  in  the  west  the  fuel  comes  from  a  forest  which  lived 
and  flourished  thousands  of  years  ago,  and  the  land  at  the  surface,  over 
the  coal  bed,  may  be  cultivated,  or  used  for  grazing,  while  at  the  same 
time  the  coal  forest  underneath  furnishes  the  supply  of  fuel.  But  in 
the  east  the  woodland  occupies  a  special  preserve  so  that  the  land  can- 
not be  used  for  farming  purposes! 


CHAPTER  THE  TWENTIETH. 

THE   BEGINNINGS  OF  NORTH   DAKOTA. 

The  Sea  Bottom  on  Which  the  Rocks  Were  Deposited — The  great  In- 
land Sea  in  which  the  rock  formations  of  North  Dakota  were  laid  down 
as  sediments  extended  from  eastern  Minnesota  over  North  Dakota 
and  Montana  to  Idaho  and  Washington,  and  south  to  northern  Texas. 


FIG.  in     Generalized  Section  across  Northern  Portion  of  North  Dakota,  showing  the  Formations. 

From  a  Crayon  Drawing  by  Miss  Bessie  M.  Willis  and  the  Author. 

Re-drawn  by  Prof.  Thomas  H.  Grosvenor. 

Into  this  great  sea  were  borne  the  sediments  from  the  surrounding 
land  areas,  and  the  waves  of  the  great  shallow  sea  beat  upon  the  shores 
and  eroded  the  rocks  into  sand  and  mud  and  distributed  them  over  its 
bottom,  forming  the  rocks  which  now  make  up  the  sandstones  and 
shales  of  the  Cretaceous  series,  or  system.  North  Dakota  was  then 
all  under  water. 

The  Cretaceous  system,  or  series  of  rocks,  is  divided  into  Lower 


THE  BEGINNINGS  OF  NORTH  DAKOTA.  203 

and  Upper,  the  basis  of  this  separation  being  the  different  conditions  of 
the  sea  bottom  during  the  earlier  and  later  times  of  the  Cretaceous 
Era.  The  Lower  Cretaceous  rocks  do  not,  so  far  as  we  know,  occur 
in  North  Dakota.  The  division  into  Lower  and  Upper  is,  therefore, 
made  from  the  rocks  in  other  states.  The  Upper  Cretaceous,  or  what 
will  here  be  called  simply  the  "Cretaceous"  series  of  rocks,  is  subdivided 
into  several  formations,  each  distinguished  by  certain  characteristics 
which  separate  it  from  the  others.  The  lowest  of  these  formations, 
the  Dakota  Sandstone,  is  at  the  bottom  of  the  series,  so  far  as  we  have 
got  down  to  the  "bottom"  in  North  Dakota.  The  other  formations 
follow  in  the  order  in  which  they  were  deposited  from  below  up,  each 
formation  being  described  as  "shale"  or  "sandstone,"  etc.,  according 
to  the  kind  of  rock  most  common  in  that  formation.  A  "shale"  forma- 
tion often  contains  some  sandstone,  however,  and  a  "sandstone"  forma- 
tion often  has  layers  of  shale.  Clays  occur  also  in  nearly  all  the 
formations.  The  thickness  so  far  as  it  is  known  is  given  for  each 
formatioi 

The  Geological  Formations.  Thickness. 
6.     Laramie   Sandstone,   Shale,   and    Clay,   with 

Lignite  Coal   1,000  feet. 

5.     Fox  Hills  Sandstone 100     " 

4.     Fort  Pierre  Shale,  with  Beds  of  Clay 600     " 

3.     Niobrara  Shale,  Calcareous  (Lime) 150-200     " 

2.     Fort  Benton  Shale 200     " 

i.     Dakota  Sandstone,  with  Lignite  Beds 600     " 

The  Fort  Benton  and  Niobrara  formations  are  together  called  the 
Colorado  formation,  and  the  Fort  Pierre  and  Fox  Hills  formations 
are  together  called  the  Montana  formation,  in  the  western  states,  but 
in  North  Dakota  it  seems  more  convenient  to  use  the  names  and 
divisions  here  given. 

The  total  thickness  of  all  the  Cretaceous  series  in  North  Dakota 
is  thus  seen  to  be  nearly  3,000  feet.  These  formations,  however,  are 
thinner  to\vard  the  east.  The  artesian  wells  at  Devils  Lake  and  James- 
town passed  through  about  i  ,400  feet  from  the  upper  layers  of  the  Fort 
Pierre  Shale  to  the  Dakota  Sandstone. 

When,  in  speaking  of  the  rocks  which  come  to  the  surface,  or  out- 
crop, at  any  place,  any  one  of  these  names  is  given  to  the  rocks,  it 
shows  in  what  part  of  the  Cretaceous  series  it  belongs,  and  hence 
whether  it  is  older  or  more  recent  than  some  other  of  the  series.  The 


204  THE  STORY  OF  THE  PRAIRIES. 

lowest  was  deposited  first,  and,  therefore,  is  the  oldest,  and  so  on  up 
through  the  series. 

The  lowest  and  oldest,  the  Dakota  Sandstone,  and  the  highest  and 
most  recent,  the  Laramie  Sandstone,  are  fresh-water  or  brackish 
formations,  that  is,  they  were  deposited  as  sediments  either  in  ponds 
and  pools  of  fresh  water,  of  else  upon  the  bottom  of  a  very  shallow 
sea  in  which  the  water  was  only  slightly  salt,  or  brackish.  The  land 
now  embraced  in  North  Dakota  was  slowly  sinking,  and  the  sea  was 
creeping  upon  the  land  when  the  Dakota  Sandstone  was  being  formed. 
The  land  was  rising,  and  the  sea  was  drying  off  from  the  bottom  when 
the  Laramie  rocks  were  deposited  and  the  great  forests  grew  which 
formed  the  coal  beds.  The  other  formations,  those  formed  after  the 
Dakota  Sandstone  and  before  the  Laramie,  are  marine  or  sea  forma- 
tions deposited  when  the  whole  region  of  North  Dakota  was  a  sea 
bottom. 

It  is  to  the  fact  that  the  rocks  of  the  Fort  Benton,  Niobrara,  Fort 
Pierre,  and  Fox  Hills  formations  are  salt  sea  sediments  that  the  \vater 
of  the  lakes  and  streams  of  a  large  part  of  the  State  contain  so  much  salt 
and  alkali.  The  salt  and  alkaline  substances  were  in  the  sea  water, 
and  so,  as  the  sediments  were  deposited,  they  were  saturated  with  salt 
and  alkali  water,  and  when  the  sea  dried  off  from  the  mud  and  sand  of 
the  bottom,  and  these  became  the  shales  and  sandstones  of  these  forma- 
tions, they  contained  the  salts  and  alkalies  which  now  dissolve  out  into 
the  waters  of  the  lakes  and  streams. 

The  highland  which  formed  the  western  shore  of  Lake  Agassiz, 
extending  from  the  Pembina  Mountain  on  the  north  to  the  Coteau  des 
Prairies  on  the  south,  called  the  Manitoba  Escarpment,  is  an  outcrop- 
ping of  the  edges  of  the  horizontal  layers,  mostly  of  the  Fort  Pierre 
formation.  This  outcropping  was  caused  by  the  erosion  of  the  great 
pre-glacial  valley  in  which  now  lie  the  level  prairies  of  the  bottom  of 
Lake  Agassiz. 

We  have  seen  how  this  great  valley  was  filled  with  the  ice  of  the 
Great  Ice-Sheet,  and  how  as  the  ice  melted  this  basin  came  to  be  filled 
with  \vater  because  the  course  of  the  river  to  the  northward  was  blocked 
by  the  ice,  and  Lake  Agassiz  came  to  occupy  the  great  valley,  its 
western  shore  being  ^the  escarpment,  or  cut  off  edges,  of  the  Fort 
Pierre,  Niobrara,  and  Fort  Benton  formations.  We  are  now  study- 
ing a  much  earlier  period,  when  the  rocks  were  deposited  in  which  the 
valley  was  afterward  cut. 


THE  BEGINNINGS  OF  NORTH  DAKOTA. 


The  "Manitoba  Escarpment." — The  great  Inland  Sea  during  the  Cre- 
taceous Era  spread  over  all  of  North  Dakota  and  a  large  part  of  Minne- 
sota, although  all  of  Minnesota,  and  probably  a  little  of  the  eastern 
edge  of  North  Dakota,  had  before  been  raised  above  sea-level  so  that 
it  had  been  dry  land.  But  the  Dakota  Sandstone  was  deposited 
over  a  large  part  of  western  Minnesota,  showing  that  the  sea  not  only 


North.A7n.encd  in  tKe  Cretaceous  $rd. 
Areas  Covered  by 


FIG.  112.  After  Dana. 

covered  North  Dakota  and  the  states  west  to  where  the  Rocky  Moun- 
tains are  now,  but  extended  east,  covering  much  of  Minnesota.  So 
the  sea-bottom  formations,  the  Fort  Benton,  Niobrara,  Fort  Pierre, 
and  probably  the  Fox  Hills,  were  deposited  over  all  of  North  Dakota 
and  western  Minnesota,  but  during  the  long  period  following  the  Cre- 
taceous Era,  known  as  the  Tertiary  Era,  and  before  the  time  of  the 


206  THE  STORY  OF  THE  PRAIRIES. 

Glacial  Period,  the  great  valley  of  the  Old  Red  River  of  the  North  was 
eroded,  carrying  away  the  sediments  which  had  been  deposited  over 
eastern  North  Dakota  and  western  Minnesota,  so  that  the  outcrop- 
ping edges  of  these  formations  now  occur  along  the  west  side  of  the 
Red  River  Valley.  ' 

The  strata,  or  layers,  which  are  at  the  top  of  this  highland  under- 
lying the  drift  in  its  northern  and  higher  portion,  the  Pembina  Moun- 
tain, and  extending  south  more  than  half  way  across  the  State,  and  also 
the  outcropping  edges  along  the  northern  half  of  the  highland,  are  Fort 
Pierre  shales.  The  Niobrara  and  Fort  Benton  formations  outcrop  lower 
down  on  the  old  valley  wall,  but  they  are  deeply  buried  by  the  drift  so 
that  we  do  not  readily  see  them.  About  ten  miles  east  of  Lisbon,  be- 
low the  Big  Bend,  just  after  the  Sheyenne  River  enters  upon  the  plain 
of  the  Lake  Agassiz  bottom,  this  river  has  cut  a  deep  gorge  in  the  Fort 
Benton  shale.  This  formation  is  also  penetrated  in  drilling  artesian 
wells  in  the  southeastern  part  of  the  State,  lying  beneath  the  drift. 

The  Dakota  Sandstone  forms  the  floor  of  the  old  Valley  beneath 
the  great  depth  of  drift  in  the  part  of  its  course  lying  between  Grand 
Forks  and  Larimore  and  southward  to  Casselton  and  Fargo,  though 
patches  of  shale,  which  are  probably  Fort  Benton,  were  struck  by  arte- 
sian wells  at  Fargo  and  Mayville.  These  probably  represent  the  tops 
of  higher  places  or  low  hills  on  the  old  (or  pre-glacial)  valley  bottom. 
Farther  south  in  the  higher  part  of  the  old  valley  the  floor  of  the  valley 
is  probably  the  Fort  Benton  shale.  This  shale  is  struck  by  artesian 
wells  in  the  vicinity  of  Wahpeton.  In  the  lower  (northern)  portion  of 
•the  valley  the  floor  is  older  rock  than  the  Dakota  Sandstone,  the  arte- 
sian well  at  Grafton  passing  through  the  drift  into  limestone  belonging 
to  the  Lower  Silurian,  which  is  much  older  than  the  Cretaceous.  The 
section  through  the  formations  of  the  northern  part  of  the  State  (Figure 
74)  will  make  this  more  clear. 

West  of  the  Manitoba  Escarpment,  in  the  central  portion  of  the 
State,  the  eroded  surface  of  the  Fo-rt  Pierre  and  Fox  Hills  formations 
underlie  the  drift.  The  Sheyenne,  James,  and  Mouse  Rivers  have  cut 
down  their  channels  in  many  places  so  that  the  strata  of  these  forma- 
tions have  been  cut  into.  The  deep  valley  of  the  Sheyenne  River  has 
cut  into  the  Fort  Pierre  Shale  through  much  of  its  course  from  Devils 
Lake  south  to  the  Big  Bend  east  of  Lisbon,  and  a  large  amount  of  shale 
was  added  to  the  Sheyenne  Delta,  eroded  along  the  course  of  this  val- 
ley during  the  time  of  the  glacial  flood  waters.  The  Valley  of  the 


THE  BEGINNINGS  OF  NORTH  DAKOTA.  207 

James  is  not  nearly  as  deep,  and  is  cut  through  much  of  its  course  in 
North  Dakota  in  the  Fox  Hills  Sandstone. 

The  Fox  Hills  Sandstone  extends  east  underneath  the  drift  prob- 
ably nearly  to  Devils  Lake.  From  the  fact  of  this  sandstone  being  the 
surface  rock  from  the  vicinity  of  the  Turtle  Mountains  south  across  the 
State,  comes  the  sandy  character  of  the  drift  hills,  and  the  tracts  of 
sand  dunes  along  the  eastern  side  of  the  old  Lake  Souris  bottom,  the 
soft  sand-rock  being  easily  ploughed  up  by  the  moving  ice-sheet,  and 
dumped  in  the  lake  by  the  melting  of  the  ice. 

The  Missouri  Plateau — Farther  west  rises  abruptly  the  great  hill- 
country  known  as  the  Plateau  du  Coteau  du  Missouri,  or  the  Plateau 
of  the  Missouri  Hills.  This  highland  is  composed  of  Laramie  rock- 
strata,  and  the  sudden  rise  from  the  lower  land  of  the  James  and  Shey- 
enne  Valleys  of  300  to  400  feet  is  due  to  the  erosion  of  the  eastward 
continuation  of  these  rocks,  just  as  the  Fort  Pierre,  and  the  formations 
below  it,  in  the  eastern  part  of  the  State,  were  eroded  by  the  pre-glacial 
Red  River  of  the  North,  forming  the  Manitoba  Escarpment. 

The  Turtle  Mountains,  on  the  International  Boundary  about  mid- 
way between  the  Coteau  du  Missouri  and  Pembina  Mountain,  is  a 
plateau  of  Laramie  strata,  surrounded  on  all  sides  by  great  wide-spread- 
ing prairies,  the  old  valley  bottoms  of  the  rivers  which  eroded  the  inte- 
rior portion  of  the  State,  and  carried  away  the  upper  part  of  the  Fox 
Hills  and  Fort  Pierre  formations,  in  the  region  east  of  these  moun- 
tains, and  the  Laramie  strata  west  to  the  highland  of  the  Coteau  du 
Missouri.  Thus  the  Turtle  Mountain  Plateau  is  a  fragment  of  the 
great  Missouri  Plateau  which  was  not  carried  away  by  the  erosion- 
which  lowered  the  whole  country  round  about  it. 

Dog  Den  Butte,  the  Mauvais  or  Big  Butte,  south  of  Church's  Ferry 
and  Leeds,  and  probably  Devils  Heart  and  Sully's  Hill  south  of  Devils 
Lake,  are  fragments  of  the  Laramie  strata  of  the  great  Missouri  Plateau 
which  have  not  been  entirely  carried  away  by  erosion. 

All  the  great  plateau  country  to  the  westward  is  Laramie.  The 
Bad  Lands  along  the  Little  Missouri  River,  and  the  Yellowstone  in 
Montana,  are  Laramie  rocks,  made  up  of  sandstones,  shales,  and  clays, 
with  beds  of  coal  and  lava.  This  great  upper  part  of  the  Cretaceous 
series  or  system  of  rocks  extends  westward  to  the  Rocky  Mountains. 
It  extended  once  much  farther  east  than  now  also,  and  it  probably  cov- 
ered all  the  State.  At  least  it  reached  farther  east  than  the  Turtle 
Mountains,  for  the  form  of  this  plateau  shows  that  the  rock  layers  once 


208 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  PRAIRIES. 


& 


66V 


:  C2L 


L  ,  I 


150  fetf 

fir  far  $tr*1'if't 

Chy,  {fydnyin 


to  71/1  5  flow. 


Ml  fett 

DRIFT 


ftfaf 
4  f  feet 


sfafe 


Mferf 
Red 


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JfCfff 


LOWER 
BILUmH 


UPPER 
CAMBRIA 


ARCH  EM 


FlG.  113.  Section  showing  the  Rock  Formations  passed  through  by  the  Artesian  Well 
at  Grafton.    After  Upham. 


THE  BEGINNINGS  OF  NORTH  DAKOTA.  209 

extended  farther  east.  This  broad  valley  between  the  Turtle  Moun- 
tains and  the  Missouri  Plateau  was  eroded  during  the  same  time  that 
the  Old  Red  River  Valley  was  being  formed  farther  east. 

The  Older  Rocks  Underlying  the  Eastern  Portion  of  the  State, Below 

the  Dakota  Sandstone  in  the  Red  River  Valley  are  still  older  rock 
formations.  The  Jura-Trias,  the  Carboniferous,  the  Devonian,  the 
Silurian,  the  Cambrian,  and  finally  the  oldest  of  all,  and  the  oldest  in 
the  world,  the  Archaean,  lie  one  below  another  under  the  rocks  of  the 
State,  and  their  thinner  eastern  edges  extend  along  the  eastern  portion 
of  the  State.  These  are  shown  by  borings  for  artesian  wells.  An  arte- 
sian well  at  Graf  ton,  915  feet  deep,  after  passing  through  nearly  300 
feet  of  drift  penetrates  several  older  formations,  into  the  granite  at  the 
bottom, — which  may  indeed  be  called  "the  bottom,"  for  it  was  the  first 
formed  and  hence  the  oldest  of  all  the  solid  rocks  of  the  earth. 

This  oldest  Archaean  granite  comes  to  the  surface  in  Minnesota 
about  Lake  Superior,  and  northward  in  Canada.  It  was  the  old,  first 
beginning  of  the  Continent,  being  at  first  an  island  raised  above  the  sea. 
Other  formations  lie  all  around  it  and  flank  or  lap  upon  its  sides.  The 
ice  of  the  Great  Ice-Sheet  ploughed  its  way  across  it  and  broke  off  huge 
masses,  which  are  the  "hard-head"  boulders  now  scattered  over  the 
prairies. 

West  of  Winnipeg  in  Canada  the  Silurian,  which  is  a  limestone  for- 
mation, is  the  surface  rock,  and  from  it  were  broken  off  and  carried 
away  limestone  fragments  by  the  great  ice-plow,  and  these  were  ground 
up  to  make  the  fertile  wheat  lands  of  our  State.  Many  of  them  are 
scattered  over  the  prairies,  not  having  been  entirely  ground  up  by  the 
ice-mill.  Boulders  of  the  softer  and  more  easily  crumbling  shales  and 
sandstones  were  soon  broken  and  pulverized  into  clay  or  ground  into 
sand. 

How  Old  Is  North  Dakota  ?— It  is  natural  to  ask  how  long  ago  it  was 
that  the  great  Inland  Sea  covered  North  Dakota,  and  how  long  it  has 
been  since  the  forests  grew  which  have  become  the  coal  beds.  It  is  a 
fair  enough  question,  and  one  which  any  thoughtful  person  is  bound 
to  ask,  in  his  mind  at  least.  But  it  is  one  which  the  most  learned  scien- 
tist cannot  answer  with  accuracy,  as  time  is  measured  in  years.  We  do 
not  know  how  long  it  is  since  civilization  began  upon  the  earth  because 
we  have  not  a  written  record  from  the  beginning.  We  can  only  infer 
from  the  marks  left  in  buildings  and  implements  and  other  things  which 
show  man's  handiwork.  So  we  can  only  infer  from  the  great  handi- 


210  THE  STORY  OF  THE  PRAIRIES. 

work  of  Nature  how  long  the  time  has  been  that  geologic  processes 
have  been  fashioning  the  -earth.  We  do  not  know  how  long  the  time 
has  been  since  the  Glacial  Period,  or  Ice  Age,  but  we  know  that  it  is 
only  a  little  while  as  compared  with  the  time  since  the  coal  beds  of 
North  Dakota  were  formed. 

Many  attempts  have  been  made  to  get  a  basis  of  comparison  by 
which  the  time  since  the  Ice  Age  could  be  measured  in  years,  but  no 
conclusion  which  can  be  considered  as  fact  has  been  reached.  Nothing 
more  than  estimates  can  be  said  to  have  been  made.  A  method  of 
studying  the  problem  is  this:  The  gorge  of  the  Mississippi  River  from 
Fort  Snelling  to  the  Falls  of  St.  Anthony  has  been  formed  since  the 
closing  stages  of  the  Ice  Age.  This  is  known  because  the  River  was 
forced  out  of  its  old  channel  by  the  drift  which  filled  its  valley,  and 
when  the  river  re-entered  its  old  channel  at  Fort  Snelling  a  "falls"  was 
formed.  The  falls  have  been  "moving  back,"  by  cutting  the  rock  ledge 
over  which  the  water  passes,  ever  since  that  time.  The  gorge  at 
Niagara  Falls,  New  York,  has  been  formed  in  a  similar  manner,  the 
gorge  having  been  cut  back  from  Lewiston  to  the  present  cataract. 
Now  it  would  seem  a  simple  matter  to  see  how  far  the  falls  cut  back  in 
one  year,  and  then  by  measuring  the  length  of  the  gorge  (from  Fort 
Snelling  to  the  falls  at  Minneapolis,  or  from  Lewiston  to  the  Niagara 
cataract),  divide  this  distance  by  the  amount  of  cutting  in  one  year. 
This  would  give  the  time  in  years  since  the  close  of  the  Ice  Age.  But 
the  problem  is  not  as  simple  as  it  may  at  first  appear.  Geologists  have 
reached  estimates  ranging  from  6,000  to  10,000  years  (Upham)  to  more 
than  30,000  years  (Gilbert).  So  that  the  result  at  best  is  only  an  esti- 
mate. 

But  suppose  we  assume  a  rather  low  estimate  of  10,000  years  for 
the  time  since  the  close  of  the  Ice  Age,  then  how  long  has  it  been  since 
the  coal  beds  were  formed  during  the  closing  stages  of  the  Cretaceous 
era?  How  long  was  North  Dakota  under  the  sea  after  the  Dakota 
Sandstone  had  been  deposited,  while  the  salt  and  alkaline  sediments, 
which  now  make  up  the  shales  and  sandstones  of  the  Fort  Benton,  Nio- 
brara,  Fort  Pierre  and  Fox  Hills  formations,  were  being  deposited? 
Attempts  have  been  made  to  estimate  the  length  of  geologic  periods 
by  measurements  of  the  rate  of  accumulation  of  sediments  on  the  sea 
bottom  at  the  present  time,  but  these  estimates  are  quite  as  variable  as 
those  of  the  time  required  for  the  cutting  of  the  gorges  referred  to. 
Without  considering  the  methods  of  computing  by  which  the  estimates 


THE  BEGINNINGS  OF  NORTH  DAKOTA.  211 

have  been  made  we  may  think  of  the  time  of  the  Ice  Age,  that  is,  the 
length  of  time  that  the  cold  of  the  Glacial  Period  continued,  as  five  to  ten 
times  as  long  as  the  time  since  the  ice  finally  melted,  or  the  time  dur- 
ing which  the  gorge  of  the  Mississippi  River  below  Minneapolis,  and 
the  Niagara  gorge  from  the  Falls  to  Lewiston,  were  being  cut,  or  50,000 
to  100,000  years  (Upham,  Prestwich).  The  time  since  the  formation 
of  the  coal  beds  in  North  Dakota  would  be  from  fifteen  to  twenty-five  or 
thirty  times  as  long  as  that  which  has  passed  since  the  beginning  of  the 
Glacial  Period,  or  nearly  300  times  as  long  as  the  time  since  the  ice  finally 
melted  away  and  Lake  Agassiz  began  to  drain  toward  the  north  and  the 
present  Red  River  Valley  began  to  appear  as  dry  land.*  This  would  make 
the  age  of  the  shales  and  sandstones  and  coal  beds  of  North  Dakota  nearly 
3,000,000  years,  and  the  time  during  which  the  salt-sea  sediments  which 
occur  between  the  Dakota  Sandstone  and  the  Coal  Measures,  the  Fort  Ben- 
ton,  Niobrara,  Fort  Pierre  and  Fox  Hills  formations  were  being  formed, 
may  have  been  1,000,000  years.f  Of  course,  no  one  knows  how  long 
it  has  been.  These  figures  are  only  estimates,  but  they  will  at  least  serve 
as  a  suggestion  that  time  is  long.  They  should  not  be  taken  by  the 
reader  as  settled  facts,  for  they  are  not.  But  that  geologic  time  is  im- 
mensely long  as  compared  with  human  standards  of  years  we  may  safely 
admit. 

Perhaps  a  better  idea  of  the  great  length  of  geologic  time  may  be 
gained  from  this,  that  the  greater  part  of  the  Rocky  Mountain  region 
was  under  the  sea  during  the  Cretaceous  era  and  perhaps  till  after  the 
depositing  of  the  rock  strata  of  the  Laramie  formation  with  its  coal 
beds  in  North  Dakota.  In  fact,  it  is  likely  that  the  great  uplift  by 
which  the  Laramie  rocks  in  North  Dakota  were  raised  so  that  the 
region  became  dry  land  was  a  part  of  the  beginning  of  the  great  move- 
ment by  which  the  Rocky  Mountains  were  heaved  up.  And  since  the 
Laramie  strata  were  deposited  and  the  coal  beds  were  buried  the  region 
of  the  Colorado  Canons  has  been  elevated  from  10,000  to  11,000  feet, 
and  erosion  has  cut  down  10,000  feet  (Dutton).  And  in  British  Col- 
umbia it  is  estimated  that  an  elevation  of  32,000  to  35,000  feet  has 
taken  place  since  Cretaceous  time,  and  canons  5,000  to  6,000  feet  deep 
have  been  eroded  (G.  M.  Dawson). 


*  Based  on  Walcott's  estimate  of  the  length  of  Caenozoic  Time,  and  Upham's  esti- 
mate of  the  length  of  Glacial  and  Post-Glacial  Time. 

f  Based  on  Walcott's  estimate  of  27,240,000  years  for  the  whole  of  Mesozoic  Time. 


212 


CHAPTER  THE  TWENTY-FIRST. 
THE  COTEAUS  OF  THE  MISSOURI. 

What  the  Coteaus  Are — A  great  region  lying  east  of  the  Missouri 
River  was  called  by  the  early  French  explorers  "Les  Coteaux  du  Plateau 
du  Missouri,"  or  The  Hills  of  the  Missouri  Plateau.  In.  the  popular 
mind  the  hills  or  "coteaus"  and  the  plateau  are  often  confused,  the  term 
"coteaus"  being  applied  to  the  great  hilly  upland,  which  is  really  the 
plateau,  while  the  coteaus,  or  hills,  are  a  surface  feature  of  the  plateau. 

A  glance  at  the  accompanying  diagram  (Figure  114)  will  assist  in 
making  this  relation  clear.  It  will  be  seen  that  the  plateau  is  of  immense 
size  as  compared  with  the  largest  hills  of  the  "coteaus."  The  plateau 
is  made  up  largely  of  layers  or  strata  of  sandstone  or  shale  rock,  these 
layers  or  strata  being  in  nearly  horizontal  position,  as  they  were  laid 
down  upon  the  bottom  of  the  ancient  sea.  The  sloping  front  of  the 
plateau  is  simply  the  place  where  these  rock  layers  come  to  an  end.  These 
strata  of  rock  once  extended  farther  east,  we  do  not  know  how  far,  but 
probably  a  good  many  miles.  The  great  sea  bottom  upon  which  they 
were  deposited  probably  extended  over  nearly  or  quite  all  of  North 
Dakota.  The  great  basin  known  as  the  Mouse  River  Valley  and  also 
the  basin  of  James  River,  were  formed  by  erosion,  or  the  wearing 
away  of  the  rocks  by  the  action  of  streams  and  the  weathering  processes, 
long  after  the  sea  had  disappeared  and  the  sands  and  muds  of  the  ancient 
bottom  had  become  dry  land.  A  great  uplift  of  the  crust  of  the  earth 
such  as  that  which  made  the  sea  bottom  dry  land,  raised  the  land  high 
enough  so  that  it  is  a  plateau,  an  elevated  plain  instead  of  simply  a  plain. 

When  the  front  of  the  plateau  is  spoken  of,  by' this  is  meant  the  cut- 
off edges  of  the  strata  of  the  eastern  part  of  the  plateau.  Crossing  the 
State  of  North  Dakota  from  the  northwest  corner  south  and  east  to 
about  the  middle  point  of  the  southern  boundary  is  the  edge  of  the 
plateau.  The  rock  layers  of  which  the  plateau  is  composed  might  pro- 
ject out,  or  come  to  the  surface  in  an  outcropping  of  rock,  only  that 
a  great  mantle  of  drift  covers  the  whole  region.  The  coteaus  are  the 
hills  of  a  terminal  moraine,  and  these  are  on  the  plateau,  but  they  are 

213 


214  THE   STORY   OF   THE   PRAIRIES. 

no  part  of  the  plateau  proper.  Look  now  at  the  diagram  (Figure  114) 
and  recall  what  a  terminal  moraine  is,  and  if  need  be  re-read  Chapter 
Five,  and  it  will  be  clear  what  is  meant  by  "the  coteaus"  as  distinguished 
from  the  Missouri  Plateau. 

"Les  Coteaux  du  Plateau  du  Missouri"  may  be  briefly  and  for  con- 
venience styled  the  coteaus  of  the  Missouri,  or  the  Missouri  coteaus: 
Les  Coteaux  des  Prairies,  commonly  called  the  Coteau  des  Prairies, 
should  be  carefully  distinguished  from  Les  Coteaux  du  Missouri,  or  the 
Missouri  Coteaus.  The  former  is  another  and  quite  different  feature  of 
the  landscape  of  the  States  of  North  and  South  Dakota.  The  Coteau 
des  Prairies  is  an  immense  hill  many  times  larger  than  any  one  of  the 
Missouri  coteaus,  though  not  as  large  as  the  Missouri  Plateau.  It  lies 
mostly  in  northeastern  South  Dakota,  but  extends  across  the  boundary 
into  North  Dakota  in  Sargent  County.  The  Coteau  des  Prairies  is  a 
large  preglacial  hill,  having  its  surface  covered  with  a  mantle  of  drift. 
Some  of  the  drift  is  in  the  form  of  morainic  hills  much  like  the  coteaus 
of  the  Missouri,  only  not  generally  as  large.  The  Coteaus  of  the  Mis- 
souri are  morainic  hills.  There  are  also  morainic  hills  on  the  Coteau 
des  Prairies. 

Le  Plateau  du  Missouri,  or  the  Missouri  Plateau,  as  has  been  stated, 
is  a  vast  upland  of  preglacial  origin.  The  eastern  edge  of  this  upland 
extends  across  North  Dakota  in  a  generally  northwest  and  southeast 
direction.  The  front  rises  quite  abruptly  from  the  plain  to  the  east  from 
300  to  400  feet.  This  steep  slope  or  front  appears  west  of  Ellendale, 
Edgeley,  Jamestown,  Carrington,  Fessenden,  Minot  and  P'ortal,  distant 
from  these  places  twenty  to  thirty  miles. 

Lying  on  the  top  of  the  plateau  is  a  great  belt  or  tract  of  hills, 
drift  hills,  formed  by  the  action  of  the  great  ice  sheet,  which  together 
make  up  what  is  known  as  a  moraine.  This  moraine  in  North  Dakota 
is  a  portion  of  the  great  continental  moraine  which  was  formed  during 
what  is  known  as  the  Wisconsin  stage  of  the  great  ice  age.  This 
moraine  extends  across  the  continent  from  the  Canadian  northwest  ter- 
ritories to  the  Atlantic  ocean.  The  moraine  in  North  Dakota  is  no  more 
a  part  of  the  great  Missouri  plateau  than  is  this  same  moraine  in  Penn- 
sylvania a  part  of  the  Allegheny  Plateau.  The  moraine  is  a  deposit  of 
earth  materials — stones,  clay,  sand  and  soil — ploughed  up  and  trans- 
ported by  the  great  moving  ice  sheet,  and  left  in  heaps  and  piles  or 
spread  out  as  rolling  prairie,  to  a  depth  of  thirty  to  100  or  even  150  feet. 


THE    COTEAUS    OF   THE    MISSOURI 


215 


216  THE    STORY   OF   THE    PRAIRIES. 

The  continental  moraine  in  North  Dakota  lies  in  such  relation  to  the 
plateau  that  it  suggests  that  something  more  than  accident  caused  the 
moraine  to  lie  just  upon  the  edge  of  the  plateau  through  a  distance  of 
300  miles  in  North  Dakota.  The  front  or  edge  of  the  plateau,  it  has 
been  stated  before,  extends  across  the  state  in  a  northwest-southeast 
direction.  The  moraine  also  extends  across  the  state,  lying  almost  par- 
allel to  the  edge  of  the  plateau,  and  nowhere  more  than  a  few  miles 
back  from  the  slope  which  marks  the  edge  of  the  plateau.  Often  in 
fact  the  coteaus  or  hills  of  the  moraine  are  encountered  immediately  upon 
entering  upon  the  higher  lands  of  the  plateau  top 

The  direction  of  movement  of  the  ice  in  this  part  of  North  America 
was  probably  nearly  at  right  angles  to  the  front  of  the  great  plateau  so 
that  when  the  great  ice  sheet,  in  its  onward  course  toward  the  south  and 
west,  flowed  against  the  edge  of  the  plateau,  which,  as  has  been  stated, 
was  300  to  400  feet  high,  this,  acting  as  a  great  wall  or  barrier,  served  as 
a  dam  to  hold  back  the  ice.  Thus  it  came  about  that  the  moraine  occurs 
along  the  edge  of  the  plateau,  because  the  ice  could  not  advance  beyond 
this  position. 

It  will  be  remembered  that  a  terminal  moraine  is  formed  when  the 
edge  of  the  ice  is  stationary,  that  is,  when  the  conditions  are  such  that 
the  ice  melts  at  the  margin  as  fast  as  the  general  mass  moves  onward. 
Because  of  the  fact  that  the  great  plateau  existed  in  the  western  half  of 
North  Dakota,  the  southwestern  portion  of  the  state  was  not  passed  over 
by  the  great  ice  sheet. 

It  is  because  of  the  occurrence  of  the  moraine  upon  the  edge  of  the 
plateau  that  so  much  confusion  has  arisen  regarding  the  true  nature  of 
the  coteaus.  The  term  "coteaus"  has  been  applied  to  the  hills  in  this 
region.  The  altitude  of  the  plateau  above  the  prairie  to  the  eastward 
has  easily  made  this  seem  a  part  of  "the  hills,"  whereas  the  coteaus  are 
hills  on  the  top  of  the  plateau  and  entirely  different  in  their  origin. 

The  extent  of  territory  embraced  by  this  great  moraine  within  the 
vState  of  North  Dakota  is  probably  approximately  7,000  square  miles. 
This  region  was  for  many  years  mostly  a  grazing  range,  native  grasses 
adapted  during  the  ages  to  the  soil  conditions  of  such  a  landscape  grow- 
ing in  abundance,  and  eaten  by  the  herds  of  cattle  and  horses  which 
during  the  last  thirty  to  forty  years  have  succeeded  the  herds  of  buf- 
falo and  antelope  that  formerly  roamed  and  grazed  on  these  lands.  The 
agricultural  value  of  the  lands  was  an  unknown  factor.  The  ranchman 


THE    COTEAUS    OF   THE    MISSOURI.  217 

was  the  only  settler.  Little  was  known  of  the  character  of  the  lands, 
and  little  question  was  asked  by  homeseekers  about  these  lands  because 
there  were  other  lands  open  to  homestead  entry  that  were  thought  to  be 
more  desirable. 

Within  the  last  few  years  the  desire  for  free  homestead  lands  has  led 
to  the  settlement  of  these  lands  by  farmers.  The  region  was  long 
regarded  as  adapted  only  to  grazing,  and  no  attempt  at  general  farm- 
ing was  made  until  quite  recent  years.  The  settlement  of  even  a  small 
portion  of  the  land  by  farmers  overthrows  the  large  ranching  enter- 
prises where  cattle,  horses  and  sheep  in  great  herds  wandered  at  will 
over  a  range  unbounded  by  fences. 

An  Unique  Part  of  North  Dakota. — The  region  known  as  "the 
coteaus"  is  unlike  any  other  part  of  North  Dakota.  There  are  other 
morainic  lands  in  the  State,  but  none  that  can  vie  with  this  region  in 
rugged  character,  in  abundance  of  the  number  of  sloughs  and  lakes,  and 
in  the  "everlasting  monotony."  It  is  not  like  the  rugged  hill-land  west 
of  the  Missouri  River,  for  there  the  hills  tend  to  have  flat  tops,  and  the 
land  is  nearly  all  drained  by  streams  and  is  often  dissected  by  deep 
coulees.  The  hills  west  of  the  Missouri  River  are  for  the  most  part 
hills  of  erosion,  and  crags  of  sandstone  and  hard  layers  of  rock  project 
in  shelves  from  the  tops  and  sides  of  the  butte-like  hills.  Among  the 
coteaus  streams  are  unknown.  The  hills  are  all  rounded  in  form,  and 
never  flat  on  their  tops.  Rock  ledges  or  shelf  rock  never  project  from 
the  sides  or  tops  of  these  hills,  and  their  tops  and  sides  are  often  strewn 
with  boulders  of  granite  and  other  rocks  unlike  any  that  are  native  to 
this  region. 

This  region  is  one  that  marks  the  halting-place  of  the  great  con- 
tinental ice  sheet  in  its  passage  across  the  northern  portion  of  North 
America,  and  here  was  deposited  the  great  mass  of  morainic  material — 
rocks,  sand,  gravel,  clay  and  soil ;  huge  boulders  so  hard  that  they  would 
phase  the  hardest  stone-cutter's  chisel  and  weighing  many  tons  side  by 
side  with  small  rounded  pebbles  and  sand  grains;  masses  of  clay  and 
soil  piled  in  heaps;  hollows  filled  with  water  or  grown  up  with  reeds 
and  .rushes. 

It  is  truly  the  region  of  hills — coteaus.  They  are  the  coteaus  of  the 
Missouri  Plateau  because  they  are  on  the  plateau.  They  are  the  high- 
est and  most  rugged  of  morainic  hills  in  the  state  because  they  were 


218  THE   STORY   OF   THE    PRAIRIES. 

formed  at  the  edge  of  the  great  ice  sheet  at  a  stage  when  the  edge 
remained  stationary  for  a  longer  time  than  at  any  other  stage. 

The  Region  Described — The  region  to  which  this  chapter  refers 
embraces  a  somewhat  indefinitely  limited  tract  which  crosses  the  State 
from  the  northwest  corner  east  and  south  to  the  State  boundary  in 
Emmons  and  Mclntosh  Counties.  The  tract  extends  eastward  from 
the  Missouri  River,  and  varies  from  forty  to  sixty  miles  in  width,  and 
erribraces  the  greater  part  of  Williams  County,  about  one-half  of  Ward, 
nearly  all  of  McLean,  a  portion  of  Wells,  most  of  Burleigh,  all  of  Kid- 
der,  the  western  half  of  Stutsman,  Emmons,  Logan  and  Mclntosh,  and 
the  western  portions  of  LaMoure  and  Dickey  Counties. 

In  this  region  are  embraced  three  types  of  landscape:  (a)  The 
eastern  slope  of  the  edge  of  the  Missouri  Plateau,  a  region  which  was 
passed  over  by  the  ice,  but  which  is  not  marked  by  moraines;  (b)  a 
region  of  rugged  morainic  hills  closely  set  with  lakes  and  sloughs,  the 
coteaus;  and  (c)  a  region  marked  by  broad  and  deep  channels  with 
little  water,  known  as  the  "Missouri  Slope,"  which  lies  outside,  or  west 
of  the  great  moraine  or  coteaus,  a  region  over  which  the  watery  from  the 
melting  ice  of  the  great  glacier  passed  on  their  way  to  the  Missouri 
River. 

The  first  of  these  regions,  the  plateau  front — the  region  that  would 
show  outcropping  ledges  of  rock  if  it  were  not  covered  with  the  drift  of 
ground  moraine — is  dissected  by  coulees.  It  has  no  lakes  or  sloughs, 
or  exceedingly  few.  The  coulees  are  deep,  due  to  the  fall  from  the  high 
plateau  region  toward  the  Mouse  and  Des  Lacs  Valleys.  This  region  is 
comparatively  well  drained. 

The  highland  of  the  Missouri  Plateau  rises  distinctly  upon  the  hori- 
zon in  the  west,  and  confronts  the  eye  boldly  from  the  vicinity  of  Ellen- 
dale,  Edgeley,  the  prairie  outside  the  valley  at  Jamestown,  from  nearly 
any  point  on  the  Jamestown  Northern  Branch  of  the  Northern  Pacific 
from  a  few  miles  north  of  Jamestown  to  Carrington,  and  from  the  car 
window  nearly  all  the  way  along  the  Soo  Line  from  Carrington  to  Por- 
tal, except  in  the  vicinity  of  Minot,  where  the  deep  valleys  of  the  Mouse 
and  Des  Lacs  Rivers  cut  off  the  view. 

The  second,  or  morainic,  type  of  landscape,  the  coteaus,  embraces  an 
irregular  belt  generally  from  ten  to  twenty  or  thirty  miles  in  width,  lying 
west  of  the  plateau  front.  Here  will  be  observed  an  utter  absence  of 
streams  or  coulees,  but  many  lakes  and  sloughs.  This  broad  but  irregu- 


THE   COTEAUS   OF   THE    MISSOURI.  219 

lar  tract  of  hilly  land  divides  the  western  portion  of  North  Dakota  from 
the  eastern  by  a  natural  division.  This  hilly  region  forms  the  divide  or 
watershed  that  parts  the  drainage  of  the  continent  between  Hudson's  Bay 
and  the'  Gulf  of  Mexico  in  the  northern  part  of  the  State,  and  that 
between  the  Missouri  and  the  James  Rivers  in  the  southern  part.  In  this 
belt,  however,  there  is  no  drainage  whatever.  The  hills  and  hollows 
are  scattered  in  confusion.  Many  of  the  hollows  contain  water,  and  are 
therefore  lakes.  Others  are  hay-sloughs  only.  The  lakes  often  occur 
at  different  levels  within  short  distances,  yet  with  no  drainage  from  one 
to  the  other.  There  are  no  streams  among  the  coteaus.  East  of  this 


FIG.  116.    A  Small  Lake  in  Morainic  District. 

hilly  region  the  land  is  drained,  the  waters  ultimately  becoming  a  part 
of  the  Hudson  Bay  drainage.  The  streams  that  flow  westward  from  the 
coteaus  are  tributaries  of  the  Missouri  River,  and  so>  finally  discharge 
into*  the  Gulf  of  Mexico. 

The  third  type  is  that  of  the  "Slope"  region.  This  is  the  region  that 
lies  between  the  coteaus,  or  the  great  moraine,  and  the  Missouri  River, 
and  was,  therefore,  crossed  by  the  waters  that  came  from  the  melting 
of  the  great  ice  sheet  during  the  time  that  the  coteaus  were  being  formed. 
It  is  the  eastern  drainage  area  of  the  Missouri  River  now  as  it  was  in 
the  time  wrhen  the  ice  waters  were  seeking  escape  to  the  river. 


220  THE    STORY   OF   THE    PRAIRIES. 

The  Eastern  Slope — It  will  be  observed  that  there  are  but  few 
streams  having  their  heads  in  the  coteaus  and  flowing  eastward.  What- 
ever stream  valleys  may  have  once  been  there  have  been  filled  with  drift 
so  that  they  no  longer  appear.  East  of  the  plateau  front  are  the  large 
valleys  of  the  Des  Lacs,  Mouse,  Sheyenne,  James  and  Pipestem  Rivers. 
These  show  the  tremendous  work  of  erosion  that  was  accomplished  by 
the  waters  from  the  melting  ice,  for  their  valleys  are  broad  and  deep 
beyond  all  comparison  with  the  rivers  now  occupying  them.  They  are 
glacial  channels  cut  by  the  flood  waters  from  the  melting  ice.  They 
have  been  eroded  100  to  200  feet  into  the  plain  that  lies  east  of  the  great 
Missouri  Plateau.  Their  bottoms  are  often  below  the  lowest  portions  of 
the  mantle  of  drift,  as  is  shown  by  the  occurrence  of  shale  beds,  sand- 
stone ledges,  and  lignite  coal  seams  in  their  banks. 

The  plain  which  is  crossed  by  these  channels  is  the  "rolling  prairie" 
for  which  the  state  is-  noted,  and  which  makes  North  Dakota  fittingly 
called  a  "prairie  State."  To  the  west  of  the  heads  of  these  streams  is 
the  sloping  front  or  edge  of  the  great  Missouri  Plateau.  While  the 
prairie  adjacent  to  the  deep  valleys  of  these  streams  is  from  100  to  200 
feet  or  more  above  the  bottom  lands  along  the  immediate  stream  beds, 
still  the  plateau  top  30  miles  west  is  300  to  400  feet  higher  than  the 
plain  of  the  prairie. 


FIG.  117.    Looking  Along  a  Stony  Ridge.    In  the  Coteaus. 


THE    COTEAUS    OF   THE    MISSOURI. 


221 


It  is  this  slope  from  the  edge  of  the  plateau  toward  the  deep  valleys 
of  the  Mouse  and  Des  Lacs  that  gives  the  dissected  character  to  the 
plain  bordering  the  plateau  in  Ward  County.  A  rise  of  nearly  700  feet 
in  a  distance  of  forty  miles  in  the  railroad  grade  of  the  Great  Northern 
Railway  from  Minot  westward  has  made  possible  the  erosion  of  the  deep 
and  narrow  V-shaped  coulees  which  characterize  the  region. 

Description    of    the    Moraine — The    extremely    hilly    tract    of    this 

region,  the  coteaus,  varies  from  10  to  30  or  40  miles  in  width,  including 

sometimes  mter-morainic  tracts  that  are  comparatively  level.     The  hilly 

iregion  is  exceedingly  irregular  in  outline.     The  term  "coteau"  means  a 

hill,  and  the  hills  are  the  most  conspicuous  thing  about  this  region.     But 


FIG.  118.    A  Stony  Ridge.     In  the  Coteaus. 

hills  are  not  the  only  feature  about  a  terminal  moraine  by  which  it  may 
be  distinguished.  This  morainic  tract  is  made  up  of  hills,  ridges,  roll- 
ing or  even  gently  undulating-  prairie,  lakes,  sloughs,  and  hay  meadows. 
The  edge  of  the  moraine  is  also  very  irregular,  having  long-  projecting 
lobes  and  being1  indented  by  deep  sinuses  of  comparatively  level  land. 
A  moraine  is  thus  seen  to  be  a  quite  complex  thing. 

The  general  aspect  of  the  landscape  after  entering!  the  morainic  re- 
gion is  distinctly  hilly.  Many  of  the  hills  are  high  and  their  sides  very 
steep  and  rugged.  Often  they  are  so  closely  set  together  that  there  is 


15 


222 


THE    STORY    OF    THE    PRAIRIES. 


no  space  between  the  bases  of  the  hills,  but  the  bottom  of  one  merges 
into  its  nearest  neighbors.  Occasionally  a  hill  is  so  decked  with  stones 
large  and  small  that  the  face  of  the  hill  appears  like  a  vast  stone  heap. 

A  few  years  ago,  before  settlers  had  occupied  the  land,  travel  through 
the  hills  to  one  unaccustomed  to  the  region  was  almost  impossible,  not 
only  because  of  the  roughness  of  the  landscape  and  the  frequent  large 


FIG.  119.    A  Landmark.    Such  cairns  are  common  on  the  tops  of 

the  highest  hills,  placed  there  for  the  guidance  of 

travelers  through  the  coteaus. 

rocks,  but  the  hills  all  have  such  a  resemblance  that  the  inexperienced 
traveler  easily  mistakes  the  hill  he  thinks  he  is  traveling  toward,  another 
insidiously  substituting  itself  for  the  one  he  started  to  reach,  while  the 
traveler  unconsciously  changes  his  course  to  go  around  a  hill' or  avoid 
a  slough.  Where  definite  trails  do  not  serve  as  a  guide  to  the  traveler 
he  is  almost  helpless,  and  a  journey  is  well  nigh  impossible. 


THE    C.OTEAUS    OF    THE    MISSOURI.  223 

The  hills  are  sometimes  so  stony  and  steep  that  progress  even  on 
horseback  by  one  who  is  not  accustomed  to  "the  range"  is  almost  im- 
possible. Following  a  well  worn  trail  one  can  often  see  his  way  but 
a  few  rods  ahead,  so  crooked  is  the  way  among  the  hills.  Leave  the 
beaten  path  but  a  few  steps  and  the  unaccustomed  traveler  is  as  one 
adrift  on  the  rolling  sea. 

One  may  be  lost  and  pass  within  a  few  rods  of  a  ranchman's  shack 
and  not  see  it,  for  the  shack  may  be  and  often  is  located  in  a  hollow 
between  the  hills  so  that  it  cannot  often  be  seen,  even  from  a  short 
distance.  The  writer  speaks  from  experience  in  seeking  to  find  a  ranch 
house  while  traveling  a  stranger  and  alone  in  this  solitary  region.  A 
miss  of  a  single  dim  fork  in  the  trail  caused  him  to  pass  by  the  last 


FIG.  120.    Douglas  Valley,  South  of  Douglas  Postofflce,  McLean  County. 

house  in  many  miles,  and  as  a  result  he  lay  down  fatigued  to  the  point 
of  exhaustion  upon  the  hard  bosom  of  Mother  Earth,  and  slept  with  the 
picket  rope  by  which  his  saddle  pony  was  held  tied  around  his  body  till 
the  cold  of  the  small  hours  of  the  morning  compelled  him  to  travel  on 
eagerly  looking  for  the  dawn  which  should  enable  him  to  find  food — 
and  what  was  more  intensely  needed,  water. 

A  common  custom  is  to  place  upon  the  highest  points  of  the  highest 
hills  piles  of  rocks  with  often  a  pole  supported  in  the  midst  of  the  rocks 
as  a  guide  to  the  traveler.  Such  a  landmark  is  always  known  to  the 


224  THE    STORY    OF    THE    PRAIRIES. 

inhabitants  of  the  country,  and  if  lost  in  fog  or  storm-  and  one  of  these 
marks  is  seen  it  will  indicate  quite  as  accurately  as  section  corners  in 
the  agricultural  portions  of  the  state  where  a  ranch  house  is  located. 

The  Missouri  Slope — The  portion  of  region  known  as  the  "Mis- 
souri Slope"  included  in  this  chapter  embraces  southern  Williams,  south- 
western Ward,  western  McLean,  Burleigh,  and  Emmons  Counties. 
This  region  is  drained  into  the  Missouri  from  the  east.  The  region  is 
marked  by  deep  and  broad  valleys  having  extensive  gravelly  flood- 
plains  upon  their  bottoms.  It  is  a  region  over  which  the  ice  did 
not  pass  during  the  Wisconsin  stage  of  glaciation,  the  stage  dur- 
ing which  the  coteaus  were  formed,  but  over  which  vast  floods  of 
water  passed,  outwash  from  the  melting  of  the  great  ice  sheet.  It  was 
by  these  floods  of  ice  water  that  the  large  channels  were  formed  and 
extensive  deposits  of  gravel  were  made.  The  valleys  of  Little  Muddy 
Creek  in  Williams  County,  White  Earth,  Little  Knife,  and  Shell  Creeks 
in  Ward  County,  Douglas,  Snake,  and  Painted  Woods  Creeks  in  Mc- 
Lean County,  Apple  Creek  in  Burleigh,  and  Beaver  Creek  in  Emmons 
County,  are  examples  of  broad  and  deep  valleys,  generally  with  large 
flood-plains  of  sand  and  gravel,  that  were  formed  by  the  waters  from 
the  melting  ice  during,  or  immediately  following,  the  Wisconsin  stage 
of  glaciation. 

The  Older  and  the  Newer  Drift. — The  great  moraine  which  is  known 
as  the  coteaus,  and  which,  as  has  been  stated,  was  formed  at  the  edge 
of  the  great  ice  sheet  when  it  had  advanced  so  far  south  and  west 
as  to  lie  upon  the  eastern  portion  of  the  great  Missouri  Plateau,  repre- 
sents the  limits  reached  by  the  great  flood  of  ice  during  this  stage  of  the 
Glacial  Period.  But  there  is  drift  farther  west  than  the  coteaus.  The 
drift  of  the  overwash  region  west  of  the  coteaus  does  not  represent  the 
most  western  deposits  of  drift  materials.  There  are  deposits  of  drift 
soil,  sand,  gravel  and  large  boulders  far  beyond  the  Missouri  River. 
Soil  that  is  thought  to  be  of  glacial  origin,  pebbles  that  show  by  their 
form  and  composition  that  they  are  drift  pebbles,  and  boulders  of  gran- 
ite which  are  entirely  unlike  any  rocks  of  which  the  hills  are  composed, 
occur  over  large  areas  in  Morton,  Oliver,  Mercer,  Dunn,  and  McKenzie 
Counties,  How  then  is  this  to  be  explained?  Does  the  great  range  of 
hills  that  has  been  described  really  represent  the  halting-place  of  the 
edge  of  the  ice  of  the  great  continental  ice  sheet  ?  Yes,  the  coteaus  repre- 
sent the  great  terminal  moraine  formed  at  the  edge  of  the  ice  at  the 


THE    COTEAUS    OF    THE    MISSOURI.  225 

time  of  the  greatest  advance  of  the  ice  sheet  at  this  stage  of  the  Glacial 
Period.  But  the  Glacial  Period  was  probably  very  long,  and  it  was 
made  up  of  several  stages,  each  stage  representing  a  long  time. 

It  is  as  though  a  great  battle  between  heat  and  cold  had  been  going 
on  through  long  ages.  When  the  cold  gained  the  mastery  and  the  snow 
and  ice  did  not  melt  as  fast  as  they  accumulated  then  the  ice  sheet  grew 
larger  and  deeper,  and  spread  out  over  more  of  the  land.  Then  in  turn 
a  warmer  condition  of  climate  might  have  occurred  causing  the  snow 
and  ice  to  melt  more  rapidly  than  they  gathered,  and  thus  the  amount 
of  ice  composing  the  great  ice  sheet  would  grow  less.  Far  from  the 
edges  of  the  great  sheet  the  ice  might  become  less  deep  from  melting, 
and  great  streams  of  water  probably  ran  off  from  the  ice  or  down  through 
cracks  or  crevasses  to  the  ground,  and  probably  may  have  formed 
streams  under  the  ice.  At  the  edges  of  the  great  sheet  the  melting  ice 
would  cause  streams  of  ice  water  to  form  and  flow  away.  If  there 
continued  to  be  more  melting  than  there  was  snow-fall  then  the  mass 
of  the  ice  would  tend  to  grow  smaller,  and  the  edge  of  the  ice  would 
retreat  back  toward  the  center  of  accumulation  or  point  from  which  the 
ice  came. 

Now,  if  these  conditions  of  advance  and  retreat  continued,  each  for 
a  long  time,  these  would  constitute  two  stages  of  the  great  Glacial 
Period.  The  time  when  the  coteaus  were  formed  at  the  edge  of  the 
great  ice  sheet,  a  time  that  represents  a  stage  of  advance,  is  known  as 
the  Wisconsin  stage  of  the  Glacial  Period.  The  time  following  this 
stage  when  melting  was  more  rapid  than  the  onward  movement,  so  that 
the  edge  "retreated"  and  the  mass  of  the  ice  of  the  great  ice  sheet  grew 
less,  is  known  as  an  interval  or  stage  of  deglaciation  or  melting.  Prob- 
ably the  climate  was  warmer  during  this  stage,  and  the  time  was  probably 
very  long,  as  we  measure  time  in  centuries.  How  long  it  was,  or  how 
warm  the  climate,  or  what  caused  the  changes,  we  do  not  know.  It  is 
the  facts  that  concern  us  now  rather  than  the  causes,  and  we  may  leave 
the  question  of  causes  till  another  time.  We  may  not  live  to  learn  the 
nature  of  the  causes,  though  these  may  be  ascertained  sometime. 

There  still  remains  unexplained  the  drift  west  of  the  Missouri  River, 
and  all  that  drift  west  of  the  coteaus  which  was  not  washed  down  (Jirect- 
iy  from  the  edge  of  the  ice  or  from  the  coteaus  themselves  after  their 
deposition.  When  was  the  drift  deposited  here?  We  say  deposited, 
for  it  is  evident  from  the  character  of  the  material — the  soil,  sand, 


226 


THE    STORY    OF   THE    PRAIRIES. 


gravel,  and  boulders, — that  it  was  not  formed  here,  but  has  been  trans- 
ported here  and  deposited.  Was  there  an  earlier  stage  of  glaciation 
than  the  Wisconsin?  Did  the  ice  of  an  earlier  stage  push  farther  west, 
even  beyond  where  the  great  Missouri  River  now  is?  Yes,  this  is  what 
is  supposed  to  have  occurred. 

Let  us  be  reminded  again  that  we  are  not  asking  about  causes  now, 
but  about  facts.  Did  the  ice  once  extend  fifty  or  a  hundred  miles  west 
of  the  great  moraine  which  has  been  described?  No  man  was  there  to 
write  a  history,  or  if  man  did  exist  on  the  earth  at  that  time  (and  there 
are  geologists  who  think  that  he  did)  he  did  not  leave  any  record  of  his 
observations  that  have  since  been  discovered.  We  can  therefore  only 
know  of  the  ice  having  been  farther  west  than  the  Missouri  River  by 
the  character  of  the  things  we  can  find  in  the  field.  This  leads  often 
to  long  and  painstaking  investigations  to  determine.  But  we  may  take 
the  results  of  many  studies  made  at  different  times  by  different  -ob- 
servers, going  into  the  field  ourselves  to  verify  our  conclusions.  The 
peculiar  soil,  the  pebbles,  and  gravel,  the  granite  boulders,  the  rocks 
with  marks  on  them  such  as  have  been  recognized  in  all  "glaciated" 
regions  all  tell  of  something  having  transported  a  large  amount  of  earth 
materials  from  some  other  region  and  deposited  them  here,  and  nearly 
all  geologists  now  agree  that  the  agent  that  did  the  work  was  ice. 


FIG.  121.    Channel  of  Glacial  Drainage. 


THE    COTEAUS    OF   THE    MISSOURI.  227 

We  conclude  then  that  there  has  been  in  this  region  an  earlier  ice 
invasion.  The  stage  of  the  Glacial  Period  when  the  continent  from 
Hudson  Bay  to  this  region  west  of  the  present  Missouri  River  was  all 
covered  with  a  vast  sheet  of  ice  is  known  as  the  Kansan  stage  of  the 
Glacial  Period.  The  drift  that  lies  west  of  the  Missouri  River,  and 
much  of  that  lying  between  the  coteaus  and  the  Missouri  River,  is 
Kansan  drift.  Just  how  it  differs  from  the  drift  of  the  Wisconsin  stage, 
and  just  how  geologists  distinguish  between  the  two  deposits  we  shall 
not  attempt  to  discuss  at  this  time.  It  may  be  stated  merely  that  the 
Kansan  drift  is  thought  to  be  much  older  than  that  of  the  Wisconsin 
stage,  and  differs  from  it  in  important  respects. 

This  drift  has  been  in  some  places 'nearly  or  quite  all  washed  away 
so  that  but  little  or  none  at  all  remains  covering  the  original  land  sur- 
face. It  has  been  deeply  eroded  in  many  places  by  the  streams  of  ice 
water  which  flowed  away  from  the  great  glacier  during  and  following 
the  Wisconsin  stage.  Little  Muddy,  White  Earth,  Little  Knife,  Shell, 
Douglas,  Snake,  Painted  Woods,  Apple,  and  Beaver  Creeks  are  exam- 
ples of  such  channels  that  were  eroded  into  the  older  drift  in  their  upper 
courses,  and  further  toward  the  Missouri  have  cut  entirely  through  the 
mantle  of  older  drift  into  the  underlying  rock,  as  is  shown  by  the  out- 
cropping ledges  of  sandstone,  shale,  and  lignite  coal  along  the  banks  of 
these  streams. 


228 


CHAPTER  THE  TWENTY-SECOND. 
THE  PLATEAU  REGION  OF  NORTH  DAKOTA. 

State  boundaries  are  arbitrary  lines  agreed  upon  by  men.  Geographic 
districts  are  regions  that  have  some  natural  reasons  for  being  separated 
from  other  regions.  The  state  of  North  Dakota  includes  within  the 
arbitrary  boundary  of  its  rectangular  outline  parts  of  two  distinct 
geographic  districts.  The  line  separating  these  districts  extends  in  a 
northwest-southeast  direction  in  a  general  way  parallel  with  and  about 
60  miles  east  of  the  course  of  the  Missouri  River.  More  accurately 
described  it  crosses  the  state  from  the  extreme  northwest  corner,  south- 
eastward through  western  Ward,  eastern  McLean  and  central  Stuts- 
man  Counties,  to  the  southern  boundary  in  the  western  part  of  Dickey 
county.  This  line  marks  very  nearly  the  eastern-facing  slope  or  escarp- 
ment of  a  great  westward  rising  bench  of  upland,  the  Missouri  Plateau. 
The  escarpment  rises  abruptly  to  an  altitude  of  300  to  400  feet  above  the 
generally  level  plain  on  the  east. 

The  geographic  significance  of  this  natural  boundary  lies  in  the 
fact  that  here  the  prairie  plains  end  and  the  great  plateau  begins.  Ex- 
tending north  far  into  British  America  and  south  almost  to  the  Gulf 
of  Mexico,  though  less  conspicuous  as  a  landscape  feature  farther  south, 
this  great  earth  bench  or  escarpment  is  the  continental  threshold  from 
the  low  prairies  of  the  central  west  to  the  Great  Plains  which  rise  thence 
westward  to  the  foothills  of  the  Rocky  Mountains. 

Boundary. — The  southwestern  part  of  North  Dakota  is  thus  in- 
cluded within  the  geographic  district  of  the  Missouri  Plateaus.  A  brief 
review  of  the  principal  features  of  this  relatively  large  physiographic 
district  is  here  given  in  order  to  set  forth  more  fully  the  geographic 
relations  of  that  part  within  the  state  of  North  Dakota.  This  plateau- 
province  extends  a  short  distance  across  the  International  Boundary 
line  as  far  as  the  divide  between  the  head  waters  of  the  Saskatchewan 
river  and  the  southward-flowing  tributaries  of  the  upper  Missouri  River. 
Its  southern  boundary  extends  through  central  Wyoming  as  the  divide 

229 


230  THE    STORY    OF   THE    PRAIRIES. 

between  the  Platte  and  Yellowstone  rivers,  and  thence  eastward,  south- 
ward of  the  Black  Hills,  to  the  Missouri  Escarpment  in  central  South 
Dakota. 

Great  Plains — The  region  known  as  the  Great  Plains  extends  from 
some  distance  beyond  the  Rio  Grande  River  in  Mexico  through  the 
United  States  and  far  in  British  America.  This  constitutes  what  is 
called  a  geographic  province,  and  is  one  of  the  natural  divisions  of  the 
North  American  continent.  The  northern  portion  of  this  Great  Plains 
belt  is  what  is  known  as  the  Missouri  Plateau  district.  This  is  a  great 
natural  district  because  it  is  separated  from  the  regions  that  surround 
it  by  some  sort  of  natural  boundaries. 

The  surface  features  of  this  region  are  simple,  but  developed  on  a 
grand  scale.  That  is,  there  is  nothing  particularly  strange  or  difficult 
to  understand  about  the  structure  of  the  landscape,  only  that  everything 
is  big  and  laid  out  on  a  large  plan. 

General  Topography  and  Structure. — A  notion  of  the  general  struct- 
ure and  topography  of  the  district  may  be  formed  by  considering 
the  plateau  a  vast  earth  block  two  miles  in  thickness  and  500  miles 
square,  built  up  of  level-bedded  rock  layers.  This  seems  like  a  pretty 
large  thing  to  talk  about  in  common  words,  or  rather  it  seems  a  rather 
large  thing  to  grasp  in  the  imagination.  But  its  size  is  the  most  awk- 
ward thing  about  it.  It  is  really  a  simple  problem — a  very  large  earth 
block. 

The  western  border  of  the  plateau,  where  it  merges  into  the  eastern 
flanks  of  the  Stony  Mountains,  has  an  altitude  ranging  from  4,500  feet 
to  6,000  feet  above  sea  level.  The  western  somewhat  ragged  edge  is 
warped  up  against  the  mountain  slope  and  beveled  off  by  slow  decay  of 
the  rocks  and  the  erosion  of  mountain  streams.  The  warping  of  the 
layers  of  rocks  on  to  the  mountain  slopes  is  due  to  the  bending  of  the 
strata  when  the  mountains  were  uplifted.  The  strata  thus  lap  up  on  to 
the  mountain  sides.  This  is  because  the  mountains  were  upheaved  after 
these  rocks  were  deposited,  and  so  they  were  bent  up  in  the  upheaval 
that  produced  the  mountains.  The  rocks  that  were  thus  bent,  and  that 
now  flank  the  mountains  on  the  east  have  been  beveled  off  by  erosion 
and  weathering.  The  upper  layers  in  this  western  portion  of  the  great 
block  have  been  worn  away  so  that  the  thickness  of  the  rock  layers  there 
from  top  to  bottom  of  the  block  is  not  now  as  great  as  it  once  was. 


THE   PLATEAU   REGION    OF   NORTH   DAKOTA.  231 

The  eastern  margin  of  the  great  block  has  been  worn  down  by  ero- 
sion during!  long  ages  to  a  steep  slope  facing!  the  prairies  on  the  east, 
the  slope  that  rises  west  of  Ellendale,  Jamestown,  Carrington,  Fessen- 
den,  Balfour,  Kenmare,  and  Portal.  The  surface  of  this  huge  block  has 
been  trenched  or  cut  into  by  winding  streams,  and  sculptured  by  weath- 
ering. From  beneath,  that  is,  in  the  lower  depths  of  the  rocks  of  which 
this  great  block  is  composed,  the  layers  in  the  western  half  of  the  block 
have  been  riven  and  thrust  into  by  plugs  and  dikes  of  molten  rock,  and 
in  many  places  the  layers  above  have  been  pierced  entirely  through  by 
the  forces  from  below  so  that  the  lavas  flowed  out  upon  the  surface. 
So  great  was  the  force  from  below  that  the  strata  were  lifted  bodily,  the 
different  layers  wedged  and  spread  apart,  and  the  upper  layers  up- 
turned. 

This  means  that  the  rocks  have  been  much  broken  and  pushed  out 
of  their  original  positions,  openings  like  volcanic  necks  or  throats  have 
been  made  through  the  overlying:  strata,  and  molten  rock  or  lava  forced 
into  these  tubes  or  openings.  When  the  region  again  became  cool  these 
openings  were  left  "plugged"  with  lava.  Such  lava  is  often  hard,  and 
when  the  softer  rocks  surrounding  are  later  worn  away  these  hard 
masses  are  left  sticking  out  as  "volcanic  plugs."  When  great  cracks 
or  fractures  were  made  in  the  rocks  by  the  tremendous  forces  that  built 
the  mountains  these  spaces  were  also  filled  with  moulten  rock  forced  up 
from  below.  These  masses  of  molten  lava  when  cooled  are  also  fre- 
quently very  hard  and  resistant  to  the  weathering  agencies,  and  so  they 
often  appear  as  great  solid  stone  walls  projecting  out  of  the  earth,  and 
are  known  as  dikes.  When,  however,  the  molten  rock  or  lava  was  forced 
up  through  these  tubes  or  cracks  clear  to  the  very  surface  and  was 
poured  out  in  such  quantities  that  it  flooded  the  whole  region  round 
about  them  this  became  what  is  known  as  a  lava-flow,  and  the  result 
now  is  a  sheet  of  lava  covering  the  earth. 

Laccolite  Mountains — Some  times  the  force  from  below  was  so 
very  great  that  immense  masses  of  lava  were  forced  in  between  the  lay- 
ers of  rock  and  pushed  them  apart  like  a  huge  wedge.  This  resulted  in 
causing  an  uplift  of  the  rock  layers  above,  and  sometimes  the  uplift  was 
so  great  that  the  upper  layers  were  turned  up  into  a  vertical  position,  and 
even  sometimes  completely  overturned. 

These  upwellings  of  molten  rock  in  many  cases  assumed  the  form  of 
vast  reservoirs  and  lakes  of  lava ;  such  fluid  masses,  since  hardened  into 


232 


THE    STORY    OF    THE    PRAIRIES. 


solid  rock,  were  so  enormous  in  dimensions  that  out  of  them  the  agen- 
cies of  rain  and  rivers  have  carved  whole  mountain  ranges.  The  mass 
of  solidified  material  out  of  which  the  sculpturing  agencies  have  since 
formed  a  mountain  is  called  a  laccolite,  or  laccolith,  a  term  which  means 
a  lake  of  lava.  An  example  of  an  upthrusted  laccolite  mountain  is  the 
Madison  Range  northwest  of  Yellowstone  Park.a  The  peaks  of  this 
range  now  stand  at  an  altitude  of  a  mile  above  the  general  level  of  the 
plateau  or  surface  of  the  earth  block. 

Lesser    Plateaus. — The    larger    streams    and    their    tributaries    have 
cut  deeply  into  the  surface  forming  wide  valleys  with  steep  bluffs  bor- 


FiG.  123.    West  Rainy  Butte,  Billings  County.    Photograph  by  A.  L.  Fellows. 

dering  their  sides.  Irregular  areas  of  the  great  plateau  have  been  thus 
cut  around  by  the  streams,  and  when  the  top  layers  of  rock  are  hard  and 
resistant  to  the  action  of  the  weathering  agencies  of  frost,  wind,  and 
rain  flat  topped  table  lands  or  small  plateaus  are  formed. 

In  the  western  portion  of  this  district  many  such  blocks  of  rock  that 
have  been  cut  around  by  the  streams  are  large  enough  to  be  called  moun- 
tains.    In  the  eastern  part  of  the  region,  and  along  the  lower  courses 
of  the  rivers  erosion  has  been  more  effective  in  broadening  the  slopes 
a  Three  Forks  Folio,  Montana,  U.  S.  Geol.  Survey. 


THE    PLATEAU   REGION    OF    NORTH   DAKOTA.  233 

and  removing  the  original  plateau  surface.  Here  therefore  such  plateaus 
are  less  common,  and  when  they  do  occur  they  are  generally  smaller  in 
area  and  less  high.  Erosion  has  more  completely  removed  them. 

Monadnocks — Where  the  old  landscape  surface  has  been  nearly 
worn  away  and  removed  by  erosion,  but  occasional  small  plateaus  or 
large  buttes  are  left  as  hills,  these  are  called  monadnocks,  a  name  derived 
from  Mount  Monadnock,  a  hill  in  New  Hampshire  which  is  of  this 


FlG.  124.     Brow  of  East  Rainy  Butte,  Billings  County.    Photograph  by  A.  L.  Fellows. 

type.  Monadnocks  are  a  characteristic  feature  of  the  landscape  in  west- 
ern North  Dakota.  They  will  be  referred  to  again  later  in  this  chapter. 
They  are  referred  to  in  Chapter  Eighteen  as  older  buttes  standing  on  the 
shoulders  of  the  younger  buttes.  They  sustain  the  same  relation  to  the 
old  landscape  surface  of  the  plateau  before  it  was  eroded  that  the  Turtle 
Mountain  Plateau  does  to  the  present  surface  of  the  Missouri  Plateau. 
Work  of  Rivers — In  the  eastern  portion  of  the  plateau  more  es- 
pecially than  elsewhere  the  Missouri  River  and  its  tributaries  have  been 
the  controlling  agencies  in  making  the  landscape  what  it  is  today.  The 
hills,  ridges,  valleys,  and  plains  make  up  what  is  called  the  topography, 
or  the  form  of  the  landscape.  The  work  of  excavation  accomplished  by 


234 


THE    STORY    OF   THE    PRAIRIES. 


the  streams  is  represented  byv  the  amount  of  earth  necessary  to  fill  their 
valleys  up  to  a  level  with  the  highest  hill-tops.  The  hills  down  to  the 
level  of  the  lowest  streams  of  the  region  represent  the  unfinished  work  of 
the  rivers. 

This  not  only  means  to  fill  up  the  stream  valleys  to  the  level  of  the 
highest  land  along  the  bluffs,  but  to  fill  in  the  whole  region  till  it  is  all 
brought  to  the  level  of  the  highest  hilltops  of  the  region.  Look  up  at 
the  top  of  the  highest  hill  you  know  of  and  imagine  a  line  extending 
horizontally  from  this  highest  point,  and  that  all  the  region  is  filled  in 
with  earth  up  to  this  level.  On  the  other  hand  the  work  that  remains 
for  the  rivers  to  do  yet  is  represented  by  the  carrying1  away  of  all  the 
earth  of  which  the  hills  and  all  the  land  surrounding  them  are  composed 
down  to  the  level  of  the  lowest  stream  bottoms  of  the  region. 

Divisions — The  Missouri  River  flowing  diagonally  across  the  state 
divides  the  North  Dakota  plateau  region  into  two  parts,  viz.,  a  wide 
plain  sloping  eastward  to  the  river  and  embracing  all  of  the  southwest- 
ern portion  of  the  state  lying  between  the  western  boundary  line  of  the 
state  and  the  river,  and  a  narrow  belt  bordering  the  river  on  the  east 
and  extending  to  the  edge  of  the  plateau.  These  two  divisions  of  the 


FIG.  125.    Alkali  Lake,  Northern  Williams  County.     The  lake  bottom  is  entirely  dry,  the 
surface  being  covered  with  alkaline  salts.     Photograph  by  Rex  Willara. 


THE    PLATEAU   REGION    OF   NORTH   DAKOTA.  235 

plateau  comprise  what  is  popularly  known  as  the  "Missouri  Slope"  in 
North  Dakota,  and  is  frequently  referred  to  as  "the  Slope." 

Slopes — In  the  western  portion  of  North  Dakota  the  surface  of  the 
plateau  is  characterized  by  slopes,  wide  and  gentle  for  the  most  part, 
but  steep  and  rugged  in  the  vicinity  of  streams.  They  appear  at  first  to 
be  arranged  without  order,  yet  every  slope,  gentle  or  steep,  leads  down- 
ward ultimately  to  the  channel  of  a  stream.  These  slopes  were  all 
formed  by  running  water,  except  in  cases  where  landslides  or  other  dis- 
turbing factors  have  entered  in.  Every  hillside  is  a  part  of  trm  side  of 
a  valley.  The  surface  of  the  country  is  therefore  completely  drained. 
Lakes  and  marshes  do  not  exist.  If  they  existed  once,  as  they  very 
likely  did,  they  have  all  -been  drained  by  the  streams.  Streams  have 
formed  and  are  still  controlling  the  features  of  the  landscape  plain. 

Comparison  with  Ice  Plains. — To  fully  appreciate  this  type  of  land- 
scape it  should  be  compared  with  that  of  the  prairies,  the  ice-made 
plains,  such  as  those  that  extend  eastward  from  the  escarpment  of  the 
Missouri  Plateau  to  the  valley  of  the  Red  River  of  the  North.  Wide  re- 
gions in  this  part  of  the  State  are  wholly  undrained.  Since  the  melting  of 
the  great  ice  sheet,  by  which  all  former  drainage  lines  were  effaced,  the 
modern  streams  have  not  had  sufficient  time  to  extend  their  valleys  and 
drain  the  depressions.  Here  hills  exist  without  valleys.  Slopes  lead 
to  hollows,  but  not  to  valleys  made  by  streams.  Hollows  occur  without 
outlets.  Lakes,  sloughs  and  marshes  are  a  common  feature  of  the 
landscape. 

The  Rivers  of  Western  North  Dakota — The  Cannon  Ball,  the  Heart, 
the  Knife,  the  Little  Missouri  and  the  "Big"  Missouri  are  the  prin- 
cipal rivers  of  the  plateau  district  in  North  Dakota.  The  Cannon 
Ball,  Heart  and  Knife  Rivers  rise  in  a  narrow  divide  which  runs  north 
and  south  parallel  with  the  Little  Missouri  River.  These  streams  flow 
thence  eastward  in  very  tortuous  channels  to  the  Missouri  River.  Wide 
valleys  bordered  by  steep  bluffs  have  been  eroded  in  the  plateau  sur- 
face. Extensive  flood-plains  and  terraces  have  been  formed  in  the  val- 
leys. A  remarkable  feature  about  each  of  these  three  rivers  is  its  rela- 
tively long  and  narrow  drainage  basin.  The  tributaries  are  short ;  they 
join  the  main  valleys  at  nearly  right  angles,  and  in  nearly  every  instance 
are  intermittent  streams,  i.  e.,  water  flows  in  them  only  during  the  sea- 
sons of  heavy  rains  or  melting  snows.  The  streams  flowing  in  the 
main  channels  during  the  summer  season  are  exceedingly  small  when 


236  THE    STORY    OF    THE    PRAIRIES. 

compared  with  the  valleys  which  they  occupy.  These  marked  charac- 
teristics of  the  streams,  viz.,  their  parallel  courses  side  by  side,  the  long 
narrow  region  which  each  drains,  their  winding  courses,  wide  valleys, 
extensive  flats  and  terraces,  find  explanation  in  three  important  facts, 
viz.,  the  climate  of  the  region,  the  structure  of  the  rocks,  and  the  slope 
of  the  plateau  surface. 

The  drainage  basins  of  these  rivers  are  narrow  and  parallel  and 
approximately  equal  in  extent  because  the  long  uniform  slope  and  struc- 
ture of  the  plateau  gave  to  one  stream  no  advantage  over  the  others  dur- 
ing the  process  of  development,  but  distributed  the  run-off  equally  with- 
out showing  favor  to  one  valley  more  than  to  another. 

The  small  size  of  the  streams  during  most  of  the  year  in  comparison 
with  the  large  valleys  is  due  to  the  great  variation  in  the  volume  of 
water  carried  at  different  seasons.  It  is  a  general  truth  relating  to 
streams  that  by  far  the  greater  part  of  the  work  done  in  the  erosion  of 
valleys  is  done  during  time  of  floods.  During  a  single  day  more  work 
may  be  done  in  eroding  the  bottom  and  banks  than  in  all  the  rest  of  the 
year.  During  times  of  high  water  the  current  is  more  swift,  and  swift 
currents  erode  with  an  increased  power  much  beyond  the  simple  ratio  of 
the  increase  in  the  velocity  of  the  current.  Thus  the  stream  at  flood 
carries  stones  much  larger  than  could  be  moved  at  ordinary  times,  and 
can  carry  many  small  stones  rapidly.  These  latter  become  implements 
for  cutting  and  breaking  the  banks  and  bottom.  Thus  the  swift  stream 
comes  to  carry  an  immense  burden  of  earth  materials,  and  when  the 
current  slackens  the  materials  are  thrown  down,  forming  flood-plains, 
which  later  often  become  terraces.  The  small  and  gentle  stream  at  low 
water  does  little  except  to  modify  the  results  of  its  more  vigorous  work- 
ing days.  This  general  law  of  streams  is  more  especially  applicable  in 
the  semi-arid  plateau  country  where  the  precipitation  in  violent  rain- 
falls and  rapidly  melting  snows  is  carried  by  the  rivers  only  during 
limited  seasons  of  the  year. 

Another  important  factor  in  producing  the  relatively  wide  valleys 
with  their  attendant  deposits  is  the  long  courses  of  the  streams  and 
the  slight  fall,  together  with  the  soft  and  easily  erodable  character  of 
the  rocks  in  this  region.  The  rivers,  laden  with  earth  materials  from 
the  soft  rocks  of  the  region,  do  little  downward  cutting  because  of  the 
slow  movement  of  the  current  at  ordinary  times.  Any  cause  that 
slackens  the  speed  of  the  current  will  result  in  sediment  which  was  being 


THE    PLATEAU   REGION    OF    NORTH   DAKOTA. 


237 


carried  by  the  stream  being  dropped,  only  to  be  in  turn  taken  up  again 
and  carried  farther  whenever  the  current  becomes  swift  again.  Under 
such  circumstances  the  streams  will  swing  from  one  side  of  their  val- 
leys to  the  other,  undercutting  the  banks  and  widening  the  valleys. 

The  low  angle  at  which  the  tributaries  enter  the  main  valleys  is  also 
due  to  the  slight  decline  of  the  slope  of  the  main  valleys.  If  the  slope 
of  the  plains  were  more  steep  the  tributaries  would  not  enter  the  main 
streams  so  nearly  at  right  angles. 


FIG.  126.    Where  the  Bad  Lands  Begin.    View  looking  east. 
Photograph  by  A,  L.  Fellows. 

Rivers  are  said  to  pass  through  three  stages  in  their  growth  and 
development.  These  three  stages  are  known  as  youth,  maturity  and  old 
age.  So  also  the  topographic  features  of  the  landscape  pass  through 
three  corresponding  stages  in  the  development  of  hills  and  slopes,  viz., 
young,  mature  and  old. 

Young  rivers  have  narrow  V-shaped  valleys  with  flat-topped  hills 
between  their  branches.  They  are  vigorous  streams,  cutting  downward 
for  the  most  part,  but  with  large  un drained  territory  surrounding.  Much 
of  their  work  remains  to  be  done.  This  is  the  stage  of  the  streams  in 
the  western  part  of  the  Missouri  Plateau,  in  western  Montana  and 
Wyoming. 

A  mature  river  has  a  wide  valley;  the  vigor  of  down-cutting  is 
diminished;  all  the  region  intervening  is  carved  into  valley  slopes;  none 


16 


238 


THE    STORY    OF   THE    PRAIRIES. 


of  the  upland  surfaces  are  flat;  the  river  swings  from  one  side  to  the 
other  of  its  valley,  thereby  broadening  rather  than  deepening  it. 

After  this  stage  the  river  declines  in  activity  until  old  age,  when  it 
erodes  its  valley  and  transports  earth  no  more;  the  steepness  of  the 
grade  of  its  channel  bottom,  which  gave  to  it  vigor  in  youth  and  matur- 
ity, is  gone;  hence  it  flows  slowly;  the  intervening  hills  are  cut  away 
mostly  to  expressionless  slopes  on  a  featureless  plain.  The  river's  work 
is  done. 

The  Cannon  Ball,  the  Heart,  and  the  Knife  Rivers  have  passed  the 
stage  of  maturity  and  are  approaching  old  age.  Only  in  isolated  places 
does  any  of  the  old  plateau  surface  remain.  The  remnants  are  the  hills 
with  flat  tops,  the  "old  buttes"  of  the  region,  the  buttes  that  "stand  upon 
the  shoulders  of  the  younger  buttes."  They  represent  the  fragments  of 
the  unfinished  task  of  maturity.  For  the  most  part  the  plateau  surface 
has  been  cut  away  and  the  hills  lowered,  or  worn  away  altogether. 


FIG.  127.    Where  the  Bad  Lands  Begin.     View  looking  west.     Southwestern  Stark  County. 

Figs.  126  and  127  were  taken  from  the  same  point,  the  camera  being  merely 

turned  on  the  tripod.    Photograph  by  A.  L.  Fellows. 

The  Little  Missouri  Eiver — The  Little  Missouri  River  rises  near 
the  junction  of  the  Missouri  Plateau  with  the  mountains  in  northeast- 
ern Wyoming.  It  flows  thence  north  by  east  to  central  McKenzie 
County,  North  Dakota,  where  it  swings  broadly  to  the  east  and  enters 
the  Missouri  River.  The  basin  of  the  Little  Missouri,  like  that  of  the 
other  rivers  of  this  region  which  have  been  described,  is  long  and  nar- 
row. It  is  about  320  miles  in  length,  and  in  width  varies  from  a  maxi- 
mum of  fifty  miles  to  a  minimum  of  about  twenty-five  miles.  Through- 


THE    PLATEAU   REGION    OF    NORTH   DAKOTA.  239 

out  much  of  its  course  the  river  drains  an  area  much  nearer  the  latter 
figure  in  width  than  the  former. 

Eelation  to  Other  Streams — By  reference  to  the  map  (Figure  122) 
it  will  be  seen  that  the  Little  Missouri  stands  in  a  peculiar  relation  to 
its  neighboring  streams.  It  flows  toward  the  north  obedient  to  the  long 
northward  slope  of  the  plateau,  but  dangerously  near  the  hip,  or  edge, 
where  the  plateau  breaks  down  to  the  east-facing  slope.  It  thus  crosses 
close  against  the  head-waters  of  the  Moreau,  Grand,  Cannon  Ball,  Heart 
and  Knife  Rivers,  separated  from  their  head  valleys  only  by  a  very  low 
and  narrow  divide.  The  rivers  above  mentioned  have  pushed  their 
heading  valleys  westward  up  the  slope,  encroaching  upon  the  territory 
of  the  Little  Missouri  until  at  several  points  the  ridge  parting  their 
waters  is  less  than  six  miles  from  the  banks  of  the  latter  stream. 


FIG.  128.    Crown  Butte.    A  remnant  of  the  old  landscape  which  has  been  protected  by  the 
hard  rock  forming  the  crown  of  the  butte.    Photograph  by  A.  L.  Fellows. 

Piracy — The  Little  Missouri  is  in  imminent  danger  of  having  its 
basin  invaded  and  upper  waters  "pirated"  away  by  any  one  of  its 
unfriendly  neighbors  on  the  east.  This  process  of  "beheading"  a  river, 
or  of  diverting  the  waters  of  one  stream  into  the  valley  of  another,  is 
called  "piracy."  The  invading  river  is,  of  course,  the  "pirate."  The  Lit- 
tle Missouri  is  most  unfortunately  located  in  this  respect,  having  such  a 
threatening  number  of  would-be  pirates  on  its  eastern  flank.  This  pro- 
cess of  robbing  the  Little  Missouri  of  its  waters  has  already  been  initi- 
ated by  the  Belle  Fourche  River,  a  tributary  of  the  Cheyenne.* 

The  upper  150'  miles  of  the  Belle  Fourche,  that  portion  extending 
from  the  sharp  bend  northwest  of  the  Black  Hills,  originally  belonged  to 
*  Aladdin  Folio,  U.  S.  Geol.  Atlas. 


240  THE  STORY    OF    THE    PRAIRIES. 

the  Little  Missouri.  This  cutting  up  of  the  Little  Missouri's  valley 
piecemeal  and  diverting  the  sections,  once  begun  at  its  head-waters,  is 
more  likely  to  be  continued  by  the  streams  successively  heading  against 
its  course  lower  down;  each  removal  weakens  the  power  to  intrench  its 
channel  deep  enough  to  be  beyond  the  reach  of  its  foe. 

Bad  Lands. — The  basin  drained  by  the  Little  Missouri  is,  through- 
out its  larger  part,  the  region  of  the  Bad  Lands.  The  river  flows 
through  the  center  of  the  Bad  Land  belt.  The  tributaries  descend  to 
the  deeply  intrenched  main  stream  by  steep  gradients;  these  short 
branches  fed  by  storm  waters  have  cut  deep  into  the  soft  clay  beds.  The 


FIG.  129.    Buttes  South  of  Williston.    Photograph  by  Rex  Wtilard. 

heading  coulees  extend  out  most  intricately  in  all  directions.  There  is 
little  weathering,  no  soil  except  in  the  valley  bottoms,  and  erosion  in 
its  most  vigorous  phase  is  the  controlling  factor.  The  result  is  a  jum- 
ble of  topograghic  forms  that  beggar  description.  There  is  no  beauty 
here.  Steep  hills  with  ugly  bulging  flanks  stand  foot  to  foot,  corru- 
gated up  and  down  their  naked  sides  with  rain  gutters.  Sharp-crested 
ridges  wind  in  and  out  forming  cirques  and  amphitheatres  at  the  heads 
of  streamless  valleys  below.  The  divides  between  tributary  valleys  are 
often  sharp-crested  ridges  not  inappropriately  called  knife  edges.  Ver- 
tical pillars  and  walls  of  clay,  veritable  mud  fences,  stand  along  the 
sides  of  deeply  worn  channels.  From  within  the  valleys  no  extended 
view  can  be  obtained;  the  observer  is  surrounded  by  vertical  or  steep- 
rising  slopes  on  all  sides.  From  the  top  of  a  lofty  butte  the  landscape 


THE  PLATEAU   REGION    OF   NORTH   DAKOTA.  241 

appears  a  myriad  of  hilltops  closely  set  together  and  massed  back  of  each 
other  until  they  blend  far  away  in  a  level  sky  line. 

Structure — In  this  region  where  the  streams  have  deeply  dissected 
the  plateau  the  structure  and  composition  of  the  rocks  are  readily  seen. 
The  formations  are  built  up  of  horizontal  strata,  "one  layer  above 
another  like  boards  in  a  lumber  pile."  The  materials  of  which  they  are 
composed  is  fine  sediment,  beds  of  clay  and  sand  for  the  greater  part 
alternating  with  each  other. 

Name — The  Bad  Lands  were  so  named  by  the  early  French  explor- 
ers because  they  found  them  lands  difficult  to  travel  through.  The 
country  seems  to  have  sustained  that  reputation  ever  since.  No  one 
who  has  ever  traveled  through  this  region  will  question  the  propriety  of 


FIG.  130.    Sentinel  Butte.    Photograph  by  H.  V.  Hibbard. 

the  name.  There  is  practically  no  direction  of  traversing  the  region 
except  by  way  of  the  waters.  Roads,  when  roads  there  are,  follow  the 
courses  of  winding  streams. 

A  Burning  Mine. — In  a  few  places  in  the  Bad  Lands  country  the 
outcropping  beds  of  coal  have  become  ignited  and  are  now  burning  back 
under  the  hills.  As  the  fire  advances  beneath  the  surface  the  baked  earth 
above  opens  in  great  crevices,  admitting  a  down  draft  of  air  and  main- 
taining further  combustion.  Such  a  "burning  mine"  is  at  present  located 
close  to  the  tracks  of  the  Northern  Pacific  Railway  near  Sully  Springs. 
Here  a  crater-like  depression,  about  500  feet  in  diameter,  has  been 
formed  above  the  burning  coal.  The  sides  of  wide  fissures  opening 


242 


THE   STORY    OF  THE    PRAIRIES. 


deep  into  the  earth  glow  white  hot  and  red  from  the  fires  of  the  sub- 
terranean furnace.  Great  volumes  of  gases^  with  stifling  and  sulphur- 
ous odors,  arise  from  the  crater,  but  no  smoke  or  flame;  the  combustion 
is  complete.  The  fires  advance  slowly  but  with  great  persistence  against 
the  bed  of  coal.  The  vein  at  Sully  Springs  is  known  to  have  been  burn- 
ing during  the  past  twenty-five  years.  In  that  time  the  crater  has  moved 
perhaps  100  feet  northward.  The  advancing  fire  leaves  behind  it  a  trail 
of  red-baked  clay  and  earth  fused  into  scoriaceous  masses.  This  process 
if  extensive  enough  in  the  past  ages  would  account  for  the  red  strata 
so  widely  shown  outcropping  on  the  hillsides  of  the  Bad  Lands. 


FIG.  131.    Crest  of  Hill  in  Ragged  Buttes,  McKenzie  County.    Showing  cross- bedded 
structure.    Photograph  by  Rex  Willard. 

Sentinel  Butte — -Throughout  the  southern  part  of  the  plateau, 
standing  back  from  the  streams,  usually  on  or  near  their  divides,  are 
sharp  hills,  serrated  ridges,  and  flat-topped  buttes.  Their  summits, 
capped  with  resistant  sandstone,  mark  the  level  of  the  old  plateau  sur- 
face upon  which  the  streams  began  their  work  of  valley  development. 
They  are  remnants  of  the  unfinished  work  of  the  streams  at  the  stage  of 
maturity,  and  are  termed  by  geographers  monadnocks.  Such  a  monad- 
nock  is  Sentinel  Butte,  located  three  miles  south  of  a  village  of  the 


THE    PLATEAU    REGION    OF   NORTH   DAKOTA. 


243 


same  name  on  the  Northern  Pacific  Railway.  From  its  flat  top,  600 
feet  above  the  surrounding  undulating  and  rolling-hilly  plain,  the  land- 
scape beneath  appears  as  a  great  map  in  midsummer,  hills  showing 
the  gray  of  range  lands,  and  valleys  the  green  and  yellow  of  wheat  and 
forage  crops.  The  hill  was  used  in  the  early  Indian  fighting  days  of  the 
northwest  by  the  United  States  troops  as  a  vantage  point  of  observation ; 
hence  the  name  Sentinel  Butte.  Two  of  Custer's  scouts,  killed  by  the 
Indians,  are  buried  near  the  top  of  the  hill.  Their  grave  is  marked  by  a 
little  cairn  and  a  rough  slab  of  sandstone. 

A  vein  of  lignite  coal  ten  feet  in  thickness  underlies  apparently 
the  entire  base  of  the  butte.  From  an  outcrop  of  the  vein  on  the  north 
side  of  the  hill  a  coal  mine  has  been  developed  and  furnishes  a  good 
grade  of  fuel  at  the  cost  of  mining  only. 

Other  monadnocks,  or  remnants  of  the  old  plateau,  whose  tops  rep- 
resent the  original  surface  of  the  plateau,  are :  Camel's  Hump,  White 
Butte,  Red  Butte,  East  and  West  Rainy  Buttes,  Square  Butte,  the  H.  T. 
Butte,  Buillon  Butte  (pronounced  Bool-yong),  in  Billings  County;  Kill 


FIG.  132.     The  Great  Stone  Face,  McKenzie  County.    Photograph  by  Rex  Willard. 


244  THE   STORY   OF   THE   PRAIRIES. 

Deer  Mountains,  in  Dunn  County;  Brenchaud's  Butte  and  Ragged 
Buttes  in  McKenzie  County;  Short  Medicine  Pole  Hills,  Pommes 
Blanches  Hills,  in  Bowman  County ;  Black  Butte,  Tepee  Buttes,  Whet- 
Stone  Buttes,  Wolf  Butte,  in  Hettinger  County ;  Hailstone  Hill,  Heart 
Butte,  Dogsteeth  Buttes,  in  Morton  County.  These  buttes  do  not  all 
have  the  same  elevation  above  the  adjacent  plain  by  which  they  are 
surrounded.  In  some  cases  the  tops  have  been  lowered  by  erosion  and 
weathering,  but  generally  their  tops  may  be  said  to  represent  fragments 
of  the  original  plain  of  the  plateau  surface. 

The  Plateau  East  of  the  Missouri  Eiver — That  part  of  the  Missouri 
Plateau  extending  east  from  the  Missouri  River  to  the  escarpment 
joining  the  prairies,  differs  in  its  topographic  features  and  drainage 
from  the  section  to  the  west  of  the  river.  During  that  time  in  the 
earth's  history  known  as  the  glacial  period  the  front  of  a  great  continen- 
tal glacier  lay  along  the  crest  of  the  Missouri  escarpment.  The  south- 
westward  advance  of  the  ice  over  the  prairie  region  from  the  enormous 
snow  fields  of  Labrador  was  doubtless  stopped  by  the  rising  margin  of 
the  plateau.  The  debris  carried  by  the  glacier,  as  fragments  of  rock, 
clay  and  boulders,  was  lodged  in  the  form  of  a  broad  hilly  belt  at  the 
edge  of  the  melting  ice.  This  belt  of  hilly  topography,  with  its  accom- 
panying marshes,  lakes  and  undrained  depressions,  constitutes  the  first 
and  outermost  moraine  of  the  continental  glacier.  The  region  is  known 
as  "The  Hill  Country  of  the  Missouri  Plateau."  From  the  melting  ice 
front  there  flowed  to  the  Missouri  river  glacial  streams  carrying  great 
quantities  of  sand  and  gravel.  The  valleys  of  these  short  rivers,  built 
up  with  extensive  terraces,  are  prominent  features  of  the  topography 
between  the  hill  country  and  the  Missouri  River.  Both  the  hill  country 
and  the  valley  region  are  excellent  grazing  lands,  and  large  tracts  are 
being  rapidly  brought  under  cultivation.  Wells  from  twenty  to  seventy 
feet  in  depth  yield  abundant  water. 

Industries — All  the  plateau  country  of  North  Dakota  is  compara- 
tively new,  but  settlers  are  moving  in  and  land  values  are  rapidly  ris- 
ing. Stock  raising  is  at  present  and  will  probably  continue  to  be  the 
leading  industry.  Fine  herds  of  cattle,  horses  and  sheep  feed  on  the 
nutritious  grasses  of  the  plains.  Ranchmen  have  introduced  the  better 
breeds  of  stock  and  realize  large  profits  on  this  branch  of  industry. 
When  crops  adapted  to  the  soil  and  climate  are  introduced  fanning  will 
become  a  larger  element  of  industry  than  at  present. 


CHAPTER  THE  TWENTY-THIRD. 
AGRICULTURE  WEST  OF  THE  MISSOURI  RIVER. 

West  of  the  Missouri  River  in  North  Dakota  is  a  vast  region  about 
which  many  erroneous  opinions  have  been  held  by  people  living  in 
other  States  and  in  the  eastern  portion  of  our  own  State.  North  Dakota 
is  so  large  in  extent  that  it  is  not  surprising  that  there  should  be  many 
people  who  have  lived  two  decades  in  the  State  and  yet  have  no  definite 
knowledge  of  the  character  of  many  parts  of  the  State.  Many  persons 
who  have  lived  and  prospered  during  a  goodly  period  of  their  lives  in 
the  Red  River  Valley,  or  other  eastern  portions  of  the  State,  have  never 
been  west  of  the  Missouri  River.  It  is  not  strange,  therefore,  that  the 
idea  has  gained  wide  acceptance  that  the  country  west  of  the  Missouri 
River  is  "Bad  Lands." 

This  vast  domain  has  but  recently  been  recognized  as  an  agricultural 
region.  So  much  success  has  been  attained  in  the  grazing  of  horses, 
cattle,  and  sheep,  and  so  little  attention  has  been  given  to  general  agri- 
culture that  until  recently  the  whole  country  west  of  the  Missouri  River 
has  been  generally  regarded  as  a  vast  grazing  domain. 

Within  the  past  few  years  a  great  influx  of  settlers  whose  purpose 
has  been  general  farming  rather  than  exclusive  grazing,  has  largely 
changed  the  sentiment  regarding  this  country,  as  it  has  also  changed  the 
character  of  the  pursuits  of  the  residents  in  this  part  of  the  State. 
Ranching,  by  which  is  meant  that  phase  of  agriculture  in  which  the 
grazing  of  large  herds  of  horses,  cattle,  and  sheep  is  the  principal  indus- 
try, has  largely  given  place  to  the  more  intensified  methods  of  diversified 
farming  except  in  those  localities  where,  clue  to  the  natural  roughness 
of  the  land  and  its  consequent  unadaptability  to>  diversified  farming, 
stock-raising  is  still  the  dominant  industry.  The  quest  of  homeseekers, 
both  from  the  older  and  more  thickly  settled  States  and  from  foreign 
lands,  for  free  government  lands  has  made  the  region  a  mecca  for  immi- 
gration. Farmers  now  live  where  but  one,  two  or  three  years  ago  was 
the  open  range  and  the  unbroken  sod. 

245 


246 


THE    STORY    OF   THE    PRAIRIES. 


Questions  about  the  climate,  rainfall,  soils,  water  supply,  available 
fuel,  and  means  of  transportation  are  frequently  asked  by  the  prospective 
homeseeker  or  the  newly  settled  homemaker,  and  an  effort  will  be 
made  in  this  chapter  to  give  a  brief  and  simple  statement  regarding  the 
questions  indicated. 

Climate — The  climate  of  the  western  part  of  North  Dakota  is  of 
the  healthful  and  invigorating  kind  that  characterizes  the  whole  State, 
though  there  may  be  said  to  be  a  little  odds  in  favor  of  the  western 
portion  as  compared  with  the  eastern.  Warmer  currents  of  air  from 
the  Pacific  Ocean  flow  southeastward  after  crossing  the  great  mountain 


FIG.  133.    Family  and  Ranch  Home  of  E.  Paulson,  Knife  River. 
Photograph  by  A.  L.  Fellows. 

axis  in  the  Canadian  northwest,  and  these  warmer  winds  influence  the 
climate.  On  the  whole  the  climate  is  wholesome  and  satisfactory,  and 
few  States  afford  more  healthful  and  invigorating  conditions.  The 
winters  are  cold,  and  there  are  times  of  extreme  severity,  as  indeed  there 
are  in  any  of  the  northern  States.  The  weather  is  not  more  trying,  how- 
ever, than  that  of  northern  Illinois,  Iowa,  southern  Minnesota,  or  west- 
ern New  York.  Extravagant  reports  of  temperatures  are  given  wide 
circulation  and  are  often  accepted  as  true  without  verification. 


AGRICULTURE    WEST    OF    THE    MISSOURI    RIVER.  247 

The  error,  it  may  be  explained,  grows  out  of  the  common  use  of 
cheap  and  unreliable  thermometers.  These  thermometers  have  not  been 
tested  and  vary  from  one  to  two  degrees  to  as  much  as  ten  or  twelve 
degrees.  Thus  a  thermometer  that  hangs  at  the  "corner  store"  may 
register  minus  46,  48,  or  minus  50  degrees  or  even  more,  while  a  reg- 
istered thermometer  at  the  same  moment  and  in  the  same  locality  reg- 
isters minus  34  or  36,  or  rarely  minus  39  degrees.  Temperatures  lower 
than  minus  39  degrees  F.  are  very  seldom  experienced  in  North  Dakota. 

An  agreeable  feature  of  the  climate  in  this  region  is  its  uniformity. 
The  greater  evenness  and  continuity  of  the  conditions  in  North  Dakota 
than  in  many  states  farther  east  saves  much  of  the  trying  character  of 
winter. 

Rainfall — The  question  of  the  annual  rainfall  of  this  region  is 
one  about  which  there  is  no  little  misconception.  It  has  long  been  cur- 
rently accepted  that  the  rainfall  west  of  the  Missouri  River  is  not  suf- 
ficient to  make  general  farming  safe  and  successful,  and  therefore  profit- 
able. This  generally  accepted  opinion,  though  requiring  evidence  to 
remove,  is  not,  in  the  opinion  of  the  write*,  a  true  verdict.  The  fact 
of  the  amount  of  the  annual  rainfall  is  one  that  cannot  be  readily,  deter- 
mined by  the  average  person  from  general  observation,  nor  yet  by  the 
closer  observation  of  the  frequency  and  severity  of  storms.  Even  if 
one  were  to  keep  a  written  record  of  the  days  when  rain  fell,  a  thing 
that  is  very  rarely  done,  still  he  would  not  have  a  reliable  record  of  the 
rainfall.  It  is  only  by  the  daily  reading  of  a  scientifically  constructed 
gauge  that  a  correct  record  can  be  obtained.  Within  recent  years  a 
considerable  number  of  gauge  stations  have  been  established,  and  these 
give  a  reliable  basis  for  estimating'  the  rainfall  for  any  particular  local- 
ity. 

Probably  one  reason  for  the  unfavorable  impression  regarding  the 
sufficiency  of  the  rainfall  in  this  region  has  been  that  during  the  time 
since  this  part  of  the  state  has  been  occupied  by  white  settlers  almost  no 
attempt  at  cultivation  of  the  soil  has  been  made,  and  when  such  attempts 
were  made  no  particular  attention  was  paid  to  the  matter  of  cultivation 
or  the  adaptation  of  seed  to  the  conditions  of  this  region.  Stock-rais- 
ing was  the  principal  industry,  and  general  agriculture  was  not  con- 
sidered at  all.  When,  therefore,  an  occasional  small  area  was  ploughed, 
seeded,  and  neglected,  and  no  satisfactory  crop  harvested  it  was  as- 
sumed that  the  trouble  was  due  to  lack  of  moisture.  It  might  be  said 


248 


THE    STORY    OF    THE    PRAIRIES. 


in  this  connection  that  if  similar  methods  of  farming  were  used  in 
Illinois  or  Iowa  loss  in  quality  and  quantity  of  crops  and  financial  fail- 
ure would  most  certainly  follow. 

Systematic  records  of  rainfall  covering  any  considerable  number  of 
years  have  been  kept  at  only  a  few  stations  in  this  newer  part  of  North 
Dakota.  Comparison  of  the  average  rainfall,  as  recorded  at  these 
stations,  with  the  records  of  stations  in  other  parts  of  the  state  where 
no  question  has  ever  been  raised  as  to  the  sufficiency  of  the  rainfall  to 
produce  profitable  crops,  furnishes  a  basis  for  an  opinion  which  at  least 
would  seem  to  contain  the  elements  of  fairness. 


FIG. 


134- 


Cuskelly  Ranch  and  Killdeer  Mountains,  Dunn  County. 
Photograph  by  A.  L.  Fellows. 


The  annual  precipitation*  for  four  stations  located  at  points  either 
on  the  Missouri  River  or  west  of  it  are  given  below,  these  records  being 
for  the  period  of  fourteen  years,  from  1892  to  1905  inclusive.  These 
are  the  only  stations  in  this  portion  of  the  state  for  which  complete  rec- 
ords are  available  for  this  period.** 


1892 

1893 

1894 

1895 

1896 

1897 

1898 

1899 

1900 

1901 

1892 

1903 

1904 

1905 

Bismarck  

18.17 

13.74 

14.32 

16.92 

16.63 

14.33 

13.67 

15.47 

17.88 

15.59 

15.95 

17.96 

14.17 

17.19 

Dickinson  
Fort  Yates  .... 
Williston  

*** 
21.23 
14.26 

11.64 
16.30 
15.45 

*** 
12.20 
17.76 

*** 
12.96 
17.07 

18.48 
20.08 
22.04 

*** 
18.32 
12.19 

11.92 
19.55 
14.44 

17.27 
17.71 
12.61 

11.78 
16.80 
15.81 

12  92 
13.42 
18.36 

16.49 
16.85 

15.00 
17.69 

15.19 
17.30 
9.44 

16.55 
*** 

10.66 

*  By  precipitation  is  meant  rain,  snow,  hail,  sleet,  or  any  form  of  moisture  that  is  "precipitated" 
or  falls  from  the  clouds.   All  frozen  forms  of  water  are  reduced  to  equivalent  amounts  in  the  liquid  form. 
**  Compiled  from  the  records  of  the  United  States  Weather  Bureau,  Bismarck,  N.  D. 
***  Records  wanting  for  certain  months,  so  that  the  correct  amount  for  the  year  could  not  be  given. 


AGRICULTURE    WEST    OF    THE    MISSOURI    RIVER.  249 

Soils. — The  soils  of  a  great  part  of  the  region  lying  west  of  the 
Missouri  river  are  different  in  origin  from  the  soils  of  most  of  the 
state,  and  differ  very  considerably  in  character  from  those  of  other  parts 
of  the  State. 

The  soils  of  any  region  are  determined  by  the  geological  conditions 
that  have  prevailed  in  the  region.  The  soils  of  this  region  therefore 
differ  from  those  of  other  portions  of  the  State  because  of  a  different 
set  of  geological  conditions  through  which  the  region  has  passed. 

Most  of  the  State  of  North  Dakota  falls  within  that  great  portion 
of  North  America  which  was  covered  by  the  ice  of  the  great  ice  sheet  dur- 
ing what  is  known  as  the  Glacial  Period.  The  surface  formation  in 
the  region  over  which  this  great  sheet  of  ice  passed  is  often  spoken  of  as 
"drift."  This  drift  formation  is  made  up  of  the  broken  and  pulverized 
fragments  of  the  rocks  of  the  land  surfaces  over  which  the  ice  passed 
together  with  the  original  soil  that  covered  the  face  of  the  landscape 
before  the  invasion  of  the  ice.  In  those  regions,  on  the  other  hand, 
where  the  ice  sheet  did  not  extend  the  soils  have  not  been  modified  by 
this  agency,  and  consist  of  the  residual  material  arising  from  the  dis- 
integrating or  weathering  of  the  rocks  which  form  the  foundation  of 
the  landscape.  The  soils  in  such  a  region  are  spoken  of  as  residual 
soils,  as  distinguished  from  the  drift  soils  just  referred  to. 

The  soils  of  any  particular  locality  in  a  region  where  the  great  ice 
sheet  has  never  been  will  therefore  be  made  up  of  the  same  materials 
that  composed  the  rocks  in  that  locality,  minus  whatever  has  been  re- 
moved by  the  process  of  erosion. 

The  rocks  of  the  great  Missouri  plateau,  of  which  the  region  west 
of  the  Missouri  river  is  a  part,  are  mostly  shales,  sandstones,  and  clays. 
The  soils  are  residual  formations  derived  directly  from  the  disintegra- 
tion of  these  rocks,  and  consist  generally  of  an  admixture  of  sand  and 
clay,  with  organic  matter  added,  principally  from  the  decomposition  of 
vegetable  matter  such  as  has  grown  upon  the  landscape  during  long 
ages. 

Among  the  most  widely  distributed  types  of  soil  in  the  northern 
states  are  those  belonging  to  the  classes  of  loams  and  clays.  There  are 
sandy,  stony,  gravelly,  silt,  clay,  etc.,  loams,  and  stony,  gravelly,  sandy 
etc.,  clays.  These  terms  have  to  do  with  the  character  of  the  soil  as  to 
texture,  structure,  and  quality.  The  character  of  soils  has  generally 


250  THE    STORY    OF    THE    PRAIRIES. 

speaking  been  determined  by  the  processes  through  which  the  rocks  of 
the  region  have  passed. 

Sandy  soils  are  derived,  directly  or  indirectly,  from  sandstone  rocks 
or  from  rocks  which  when  broken  up  by  weathering  yield  sand  fragments. 

Clay  soils  are  derived  from  rocks  that  contain  argillaceous  or  clayey 
materials,  such  as  shales,  slates,  and  clay-rock.  Loams  are  soils  that 
contain  some  clay  and  some  sand,  and  these  are  further  described  as 
sandy  loams  or  clay  loams  according  to  the  relative  amounts  of  clay  and 
sand.  Sandy  soils  are  often  spoken  of  as  "light,"  and  clay  soils  as 
"heavy."  Not  that  one  is  lighter  or  heavier  so  far  as  actual  weight  is 
concerned,  or  lighter  or  darker  as  to  color,  but  looser  or  more  compact 
in  texture.  Light  soils  may  be  dark  in  color,  and  heavy  soils  may  be 
light  in  color,  but  light  soils  are  generally  sandy  and  porous,  and  heavy 
soils  are  clayey  and  compact  in  texture. 

Subsoil  is  that  portion  of  the  surface  formation  which  lies  below 
the  superficial  few  inches,  and  differs  from  the  soil  proper  in  color, 
texture,  and  amount  of  organic  matter  contained. 

In  the  classification  of  soils  the  subsoil  as  well  as  the  surface  por- 
tion is  considered,  inasmuch  as  the  character  of  the  soil,  so  far  as 
agricultural  conditions  are  concerned,  is  determined  by  the  subsoil  as 
well  as  by  the  character  of  the  soil  proper. 

The  soils  of  Oliver,  Mercer,  McKenzie,  northern  Dunn,  and  east- 
ern Morton  Counties  are  in  part  glacial  soils,  that  is,  the  soils  are  not 
entirely  residual  (derived  from  the  rocks  in  the  localities  where  they 
occur),  but  have  been  in  part  transported  from  some  distance  by  the 
great  moving  ice  sheet.  A  belt  having  an  indefinite  edge  to  the  west- 
ward lies  along  the  west  side  of  the  Missouri  river,  which  belt  repre- 
sents the  western  limits  of  the  glaciated  area  of  North  Dakota,  and  of 
the  continent  of  North  America.  This  "belt"  of  land  along  the  west 
side  of  the  river  shows  by  the  character  of  the  soils  and  the  rocks  that 
lie  upon  or  near  the  surface  that  the  great  continental  glacier  was  once 
here.  Toward  the  west  the  belt  fades  out  and  becomes  indistinguish- 
able from  the  land  farther  west  over  which  the  ice  did  not  pass,  but  the 
eastern  part  of  the  belt  is  sufficiently  modified  as  to  the  soils  and  the 
landscape  features  to  be  readily  recognized. 

For  a  distance  of  15  to  30  miles  west  of  the  river  the  soils  are  con- 
siderably modified  by  the  presence  of  drift.  Farther  from  the  river  the 
presence  of  drift,  and  therefore  the  presence  of  the  one-time  ice  sheet, 


AGRICULTURE    WEST    OF    THE    MISSOURI    RIVER. 


251 


is  shown  by  the  occurrence  of  scattering  boulders  of  granite  and  other 
hard  rocks.  Where  only  a  few  boulders  occur,  and  these  scattered 
widely  so  that  the  traveler  sees  only  an  occasional  specimen,  and  these 
only  at  intervals  of  many  rods  or  even  miles  as  the  western  limit  of  the 
drift  is  approached,  the  soil  does  not  appear  to  have  been  greatly  modi- 
fied by  the  presence  of  the  drift,  but  is  largely  residual  in  its  origin.  In 
the  region  nearer  the  river  the  occurrence  of  boulders  is  common,  and 
the  soils  show  evidence  of  the  influence  of  drift  sands  and  gravels,  silts 
and  clays. 


FlG.  135.    Jack  Williams'  Ranch,  near  Little  Missouri  River,  McKenzie  County. 
Photograph  by  Rex  Willard, 

The  soils  nearer  the  river  resemble  the  soils  on  the  east  side  of  the 
river  and  the  interior  portion  of  the  state.  The  soils  in  the  region  far- 
ther west  than  any  boulders  of  granite  occur  constitute  a  different  series 
of  soils.  These  last,  as  indicated  before,  are  residual  soils  formed  from 
the  rocks  of  the  region.  Along  the  western  portion  of  the  indefinite 
belt  of  drift  west  of  the  river  the  soils  are  influenced  less  and  less  by  the 
drift  toward  the  west  and  more  and  more  toward  the  east. 

The  soils,  therefore,  in  the  belt  bordering  the  Missouri  River  on 
the  west  constitute  a  transition  type  from  the  glacial  soils  of  the  eastern 


252  THE    STORY    OF    THE    PRAIRIES. 

portion  of  the  State  to  the  non-glaciated  or  residual  soils  of  the  south- 
western portion  of  the  State. 

The  soils  in  any  region  are  an  expression  of  the  geological  processes 
that  have  occurred  there.  The  soils  in  the  regions  beyond  the  limits 
of  the  great  continental  glacier  have  had  a  different  geological  history 
from  the  soils  where  the  action  of  the  great  ice  sheet  affected  the  whole 
land  surface. 

In  western  Morton,  southern  Dunn,  Hettinger,  Stark,  Billings  and 
Bowman  Counties  the  soils  are  residual  in  character,  that  is,  they  have 
been  derived  from  the  layers  of  rock  which  underlie  the  landscape. 
These  rocks  were  originally  deposited  on  the  bottom  of  a  shallow  sea, 
and  when  first  thrown  down  as  sediments  were  in  the  form  of  muds 
and  sands.  During  the  long  lapse  of  time  they  became  solidified  into 
more  or  less  compacted  rock.  The  layers  or  shelves  of  rock  that  jut 
from  the  sides  of  buttes,  and  the  crags  and  pinnacles  that  project  from 
the  crests,  are  eroded  and  broken  edges  of  the  rock  layers  that  were 
once  the  muddy  or  sandy  bottoms  of  the  sea.  All  the  rock  that  used  to 
be  between  the  hills,  that  is,  the  material  that  once  filled  the  present 
valleys,  has  been  removed  by  erosion  and  carried  away  by  the  land 
waters  that  have  flowed  off  from  the  land. 

The  result  of  the  erosion  processes  upon  the  rocks,  weathering, 
transportation,  and  deposition,  is  the  soils  as  they  exist  today.  In 
places  where  there  was  sandstone  rock  the  soils  are  generally  sandy, 
because  the  sandstone  is  merely  sea  sand  compacted  into  stone.  When 
the  stone  breaks  up  by  the  action  of  the  weathering  agencies  of  heat, 
frost,  air,  and  water  the  rock  becomes  sand  again.  If  a  good  deal  of 
water  flows  over  any  region  the  soluble  and  finer  clayey  parts  are  carried 
away  by  the  water,  and  the  heavier  particles  of  sand  are  left.  It  is  this 
process  of  disintegrating  and  carrying  away  the  finer  parts  of  the  soil 
that  makes  the  flood  waters  of  the  streams  roilly  or  muddy. 

The  soils  in  the  region  west  of  the  drift  covered  belt,  have  been 
determined  in  character  by  the  kind  of  rock  in  the  particular  region 
and  the  character  of  the  destructive  work  of  erosion  that  has  taken  place. 
The  soils  west  of  the  Missouri  River  may  for  the  purposes  of  this  study 
be  divided  into  six  groups,  though  this  classification  will  be  quite  gen- 
eral in  its  application.  These  are :  ( i )  the  soils  that  have  been  de- 
posited by  the  great  ice  sheet,  or  which  have  been  largely  modified  by  it. 
These  may  be  called  for  convenience  glacial  soils;  (2)  the  heavy  lands 


AGRICULTURE    WEST    OF    THE    MISSOURI    RIVER.  253 

occupying  the  lower  places,  often  called  "gumbo;"  (3)  the  sandy  loam 
of  the  rolling  lands;  (4)  the  sandy  or  stony  areas  of  the  higher  ridges 
and  hills;  (5)  the  eroded  and  broken  regions,  called  ''bad  lands;"  and, 
(6)  the  bench  and  bottom  lands  along  the  stream  courses. 

The  glacial  or  drift  soils  are  described  in  other  parts  of  this  book 
and  need  not  be  again  described  here.  Their  occurrence  in  low  broad 
hills,  often  small,  and  distributed  in  the  irregular  fashion  of  drift  hills 
in  the  eastern  portion  of  the  State  may  be  recognized  by  any  one  who 
has  studied  drift  deposits  anywhere.  They  have  been  so  far  modified 
in  this  region  by  the  erosion  of  the  streams  that  their  true  character 
may  not  always  be  readily  recognized.  The  presence  of  boulders  of 
granite  is,  however,  always  an  indication  of  drift,  and  gravelly  deposits 
composed  of  pebbles  of  granite  and  other  rocks  not  native  to  this  region 
are  pretty  sure  indicators  of  drift,  and  of  the  glacial  origin  of  the  soil. 

In  this  connection  it  may  be  observed  that  in  Bowman,  Billings,  and 
western  Hettinger  Counties  pebbles  occur  in  great  abundance  which  at 
first  appear  much  like  glacial  or  drift  pebbles,  both  in  their  petrologic 
or  rock  character  and  in  their  rounded  and  often  smoothed  form.  These 
rocks,  however,  occur  most  abundantly  in  the  extreme  southwestern 
part  of  the  state,  and  only  scatteringly  toward  the  Missouri  River.  They 
will  not  be  mistaken  for  drift  pebbles  after  a  little  experience. 

The  "gumbo"  soils  in  the  valleys  are  often  in  nearly  level  tracts. 
In  fact  it  is  not  infrequently  the  case  that  the  land  is  so  nearly  level 
that  drainage  is  difficult.  The  texture  and  -character  of  the  soil  in  these 
places  is  that  of  a  fine  grained  and  compact  clay,  and  is  not  infrequently 
somewhat  alkaline.  The  clay  appears  to  have  been  derived  from  a  shale- 
clay  formation  which  is  one  of  the  rock  formations  of  this  region.  In 
this  shale-clay  are  some  alkaline  mineral  substances  which  were  depos- 
ited with  the  muds  upon  the  ancient  sea  bottom.  These  mineral  sub- 
stances accumulate  in  the  low  places  where  there  is  not  drainage  suffi- 
cient to  carry  them  away. 

The  sandy-loam  soils,  when  underlaid  with  a  clay  subsoil,  are  the 
best  soils  of  this  region  for  general  agricultural  purposes.  And  this 
type  of  soil  embraces  by  far  the  greater  part  of  the  agricultural  lands* 
throughout  this  region. 

The  soil  is  described  as  a  sandy  loam.  This  means  that  in  texture 
the  soil  is  more  light  and  porous  than  the  heavier  clay  soils  of  the  low 

*  By  agricultural  lands  is  meant  all  those  lands  that  are  in  any  reasonable  sense  fit  for  general  farm- 
ing, and  the  term  includes  all  the  land  that  might  reasonably  be  ploughed,  but  does  not  include  rocky 
hill  crests  or  "bad  lands." 


254 


THE    STORY    OF    THE    PRAIRIES 


places  described  above,  and  yet  contain  enough  clay  to  give  body  and 
firmness  to  the  soil.  It  is  usually  dark  in  color  due  to  the  presence  of 
organic  matter.  When  underlaid  with  a  clay  subsoil  this  gives  support 
to  the  soil  by  holding  the  soil  moisture  from  draining  away  tco  rapidly 
and  furnishes  a  supply  of  moisture  from  below  to  the  soil  above  dur- 
ing the  warm  summer  months  when  crops  are  growing. 

In  the  third  type  of  soil  referred  to,  if  indeed  it  may  be  called  a 
soil  type,  the  surface  formation  of  the  hills  and  ridges,  is  included 
the  high  or  stony  parts  of  the  hills  or  buttes,  and  the  higher  ridges 
which  are  capped  with  sand  derived  from  a  sandstone  rock  layer  j  but 


FIG.  136.    Valley  of  Cherry  Creek,  McKenzie  County.    Photograph  by  Rex  Willard. 

still  covered  with  grass  or  other  vegetation.  This  type  is  such  as  will 
furnish  pasturage,  but  will  not  generally  be  of  much  value  for  other 
fanning  purposes. 

The  fourth  or  "bad  lands"  type  is  that  characteristic  kind  of  land- 
scape which  is  widely  known  as  "bad  lands,"  but  which  in  reality  should 
be  called,  as  first  named  by  the  early  French  explorers  "bad  lands  to 
travel  through."  These  lands  are  not  adapted  to  general  farming,  and 
are  not  included  in  the  general  classification  of  agricultural  lands.  They 
are  lands  well  adapted  to  grazing,  but  are  inaccessible  to  general  farm- 


AGRICULTURE    WEST    OF    THE    MISSOURI    RIVER.  255 

ing.  The  hillsides  are  often  naked  of  any  vegetation,  the  layers  of 
shale,  shale-clay,  and  sandstone  extending  to  the  surface  without  cover- 
ing of  any  trace  of  soil.  Soils  derived  directly  from  the  erosion  or  wash- 
ing and  disintegration  of  these  naked  rocks  accumulate  in  the  valley 
bottoms,  and  these  soils  support  nutritious  and  valuable  varieties  of 
grasses,  and  produce  large  crops  of  alfalfa,  timothy,  oats,  barley,  and 
garden  crops  when  cultivated.  The  areas  that  are  available  for  cultiva- 
tion are,  however,  usually  limited,  so  that  the  general  fact  remains  as 
stated,  that  these  lands  are  best  adapted  to  grazing  and  not  to  general 
farming. 

The  soils  of  the  stream  bottoms  and  benches  comprise  a  group  of 
soil  types  falling  in  a  class  by  themselves,  and  differing  from  those 
above  described.  The  flats  and  benches  along  the  stream  courses  rep- 
resent deposits  made  during  the  flood  stages  of  these  streams.  By  flood 
stages  is  here  meant  those  times  in  the  past  when  vastly  larger  streams 
flowed  down  these  water  courses  than  any  that  ever  flow  in  them  now 
even  during  the  highest  freshets. 

It  is  not  necessary  to  give  here  a  geological  history  of  these  streams, 
but  merely  to  refer  to  the  facts  that  have  a  bearing  on  the  present  char- 
acter of  the  soils. 

The  soils  of  the  broad  level  benches  that  border  most  of  the  larger 
streams  frequently  have  a  gravelly  subsoil.  This  renders  the  problem 
of  their  successful  use  for  farming  lands  a  somewhat  difficult  one,  since 
the  gravelly  subsoil  permits  of  ready  under-drainage,  and  does  not 
sufficiently  conserve  the  moisture  of  the  soil  for  the  grain  crops  during 
the  drier  seasons. 

No  general  rule  can  be  laid  down  however  for  all  these  lands.  The 
soils  and  subsoils  represent  floodplain  deposits  of  streams  heavily  laden 
with  sediment.  Such  streams  deposit  their  burden  of  earth  materials 
whenever  the  current  is  slackened.  The  soils  will  differ  therefore  in 
different  places,  and  often  within  short  distances,  according  to  the  con- 
ditions which  affected  the  rate  or  flow  of  the  waters  of  the  stream. 

The  particular  consideration  of  these  stream  deposited  soils  must 
await  the  more  detailed  investigation  of  a  systematic  soil  survey  before 
they  can  be  correctly  mapped  and  the  types  defined. 

In  many  instances  the  flats  or  bottom  lands  constituting  the  lowest 
extensive  floodplain  are  sufficiently  heavy  to  make  valuable  farming 
lands,  and  fine  hay-meadows  may  be  developed  on  these  lands.  On  the 


256  THE    STORY    OF    THE    PRAIRIES. 

other  hand,  some  of  the  bench  lands,  while  level  and  beautiful  to  look 
upon,  are  too  sandy  in  texture  and  the  subsoil  too  loose  and  porous  to 
make  farming  by  the  ordinary  methods  profitable. 

Water  Supply — The  supply  of  water  from  streams  and  springs  in 
the  region  of  North  Dakota  west  of  the  Missouri  River  is  much  greater 
than  that  in  many  parts  of  the  State  east  of  the  river.  None  of  the 
streams  west  of  the  Missouri  are  large  except  during  the  rainy  seasons 
and  times  of  melting  snows.  However,  there  is  a  constant  supply  of 
water  for  stock  during  the  entire  year  in  the  larger  streams.  Streams 
and  springs  have  furnished  the  water  supply  for  the  stock  of  the  ranges 
during  the  past,  but  with  the  settlement  of  the  country  by  farmers  this 
supply  will  be  insufficient,  and  owing1  to  the  distances  it  would  be  im- 
practicable for  the  settlers  generally  to  depend  upon  the  water  of  the 
streams.  Some  fine  springs  furnish  excellent  water  and  an  abundant 
supply,  but  this  supply  can  be  only  made  available  to  the  few  who  are 
so  fortunately  situated  as  to  have  access  to  a  spring. 

Obviously,  therefore,  the  question  of  a  water  supply  from  wells  is 
soon  bound  to  become  a  practical  question. 

So  far  as  this  problem  has  been  solved  by  the  practical  test  of 
experience  the  results  seem  very  favorable  and  satisfactory.  Few  tests 
for  artesian  water  have  been  made,  and  the  question  of  artesian  or 
flowing  wells  is  therefore  largely  an  open  one,  though  there  seems  to  be 
ground  to  doubt  if  artesian  water  will  prove  to  be  available  in  this  region 
generally.  However,  the  sandstone  layers  underlying  the  country  should, 
and  probably  do,  contain  abundant  supplies  of  water,  so  far  as  geological 
deduction  gives  a  clue.  Experience  in  digging  wells  wherever  observa- 
tions have  been  made  seem  to  substantiate  this  view.  Good  supplies  of 
water  are  obtained  in  wells  from  25  to  70  feet  in  depth,  so  far  as  records 
are  at  hand  to  show.  Nothing  like  a  complete  summary  of  the  records 
of  the  known  diggings  has  been  made  as  yet,  and  the  knowledge  at 
hand  is  limited  to  the  occasional  observations  made  in  various  parts  of 
the  region.  These  observations  lead  to  the  tentative  conclusion  that 
there  is  probably  an  abundance  of  water  of  good  quality  to  be  had  at 
depths,  as  before  indicated,  of  25  to  70  feet,  though  it  may  be  found 
necessary  to  go  to  greater  depths  in  some  cases.  The  water  should  be 
good,  based  on  geological  evidence,  for  it  is  almost  always  the  case  that 
water  that  is  derived  from  sand  or  gravel  beds  is  of  good  quality,  often 


AGRICULTURE    WEST    OF    THE    MISSOURI    RIVER.  257 

soft,  and  generally  free  from  alkaline  or  other  undesirable  mineral  sub- 
stances. 

Fuel — Western  North  Dakota  is  abundantly  blessed  in  the  matter 
of  natural  fuel  supply.  It  is  probably  not  an  overestimate  to  say  that 
there  is  reasonable  assurance,  based  upon  geological  data,  that  coal 
seams  underlie  practically  all  of  the  region  west  of  the  Missouri  river 
and,  not  only  this,  but  it  is  so  situated  that  mines  can  be  operated  almost 
anywhere.  There  are  scores  and  hundreds  of  outcroppings  of  lignite 
coal  of  good  quality  that  have  never  been  touched  by  way  of  develop- 
ment, simply  because  there  are  so  many  accessible  openings,  so  many 
workable  mines  distributed  wherever  there  is  a  demand  for  coal.  Many 
farmers  own  their  own  coal  mines,  just  as  in  the  eastern  states  farmers 
own  a  "wood  lot." 

Coal  can  be  had  in  hundreds  of  places  for  the  mere  labor  of  mining. 
In  other  cases  farmers  drive  to  the  mine,  have  their  wagons  filled,  and 
then  haul  home  their  supply,  paying  perhaps  $1.00  per  ton  for  the  coal 
loaded  at  the  mine.  Or  it  can  be  purchased  delivered  for  a  price  that 
merely  pays  for  the  mining  and  hauling. 

Lignite  coal  burns  without  the  smoke,  soot,  and  disagreeable  black- 
ening that  accompanies  the  use  of  the  bituminous  coals  of  the  Mississippi 
valley.  A  supply  of  fuel  for  a  North  Dakota  winter  costs  not  to  exceed 
one-fifth  of  what  it  costs  for  southern  Minnesota,  Iowa  or  Wisconsin. 

Transportation — One  of  the  most  serious  hindrances  to  the  agri- 
cultural development  of  the  great  domain  west  of  the  Missouri  River  in 
the  past  has  been  the  problem  of  transportation  of  farm  products  and 
the  inaccessibility  of  local  markets.  At  the  present  time  the  counties 
of  Hettinger,  Oliver,  Mercer,  Dunn,  and  McKenzie  are  without  rail- 
road facilities,  and  the  result  is  a  long  and  tedious  journey  to  and  from 
local  markets. 

There  is  reason  to  believe  that  in  the  near  future  better  railroad 
facilities  will  be  afforded.  As  soon  as  there  are  products  to  be  trans- 
ported and  supplies  to  be  brought  in,  as  demanded  by  an  increased  popu- 
lation, a  natural  result  would  be  that  railroads  would  seek  these  avenues 
of  business.  Already  several  surveys  have  been  made  in  various  parts 
of  the  vast  region  west  of  the  Missouri  River,  and  it  may  confidently  be 
predicted  that  soon  there  will  be  lines  of  railroad  traversing*  these  broad 
and  fertile  lands. 


CHAPTER  THE  TWENTY-FOURTH. 

THE   WATER  SUPPLY. 

Conditions  Necessary  for  Artesian  Wells. — In  a  prairie  country  more 
than  in  a  broken  or  hilly  country  the  water  supply  for  men  and  animals 
comes  from  wells.  In  a  prairie  country  there  are  generally  few  streams 
and  these  are  apt  to  be  small  and  often  sluggish  so  that  their  waters 
are  not  good  for  drinking,  and  there  are  not  usually  many  springs.  In 
North  Dakota  a  large  part  of  the  water  supply  for  towns  and  cities  as 
well  as  farms  comes  largely  from  wells.  This  condition  makes  the  pos- 
sibility of  obtaining  artesian  wells  over  a  large  part  of  the  State  a  very 
fortunate  thing.  An  immense  saving  to  the  people  of  North  Dakota 
results  each  year  from  the  fact  that  the  water  flows  from  the  depths  of. 
the  earth  without  being  pumped. 

Artesian  wells  have  been  in  use^for  hundreds  of  years,  but  the  fact 
that  they  have  been  long  known  does  not  make  it  possible  to  obtain 
them  in  every  place.  It  is  only  where  the  structure  of  the  earth  deep 
below  the  surface  is  such  as  to  cause  an  upward  pressure  of  the  water 
that  an  artesian  well  can  be  obtained. 

The  word  "artesian"  is  borrowed  from  France  from  the  province 
of  Artois,  because  such  wells  were  first  known  there.  When  flowing 
wells  began  to  be  found  in  other  parts  of  the  world  they  were  called 
Artois  wells  or  Artois-ian  wells,  and  by  usage  the  word  has  become 
"artesian." 

Artesian  wells  differ  irom  common  wells  in  that  the  water  flows 
from  them  naturally,  that  is,  without  being  pumped.  They  are  often 
deep,  but  there  are  many  wells  not  artesian  which  are  much  deeper 
than  some  artesian  wells.  Sometimes  artesian  wells  are  a  mile  or  more 
in  depth,  and  there  are  many  in  North  Dakota  which  are  less  than  fifty 
feet  in  depth.  There  are  even  natural  artesian  wells,  in  which  the 
water  rises  to  the  surface  as  springs,  but  yet  the  flowing  of  the  water  is 
due  to  the  same  causes  as  those  which  make  the  flow  from  a  boring. 

The  reader  will  be  able  to  understand  the  conditions  which  are 
necessary  for  an  artesian  well  from  Figure  137.  The  section  shows  the 


THE   WATER    SUPPLY.  259 

relation  of  the  underlying  rocks  from  the  Red  River  Valley  westward 
to  the  Rocky  Mountains.  The  source  of  the  water  supply  is  the  region 
along  the  base  of  the  Rocky  Mountains  where  the  rain  which  falls  upon 
the  ground  soaks  into  the  soil  and  travels  underground  along  the 
porous  gravel  and  sand  of  the  Dakota  Sandstone.  The  water  follows 
this  layer  at  first  for  the  same  reason  that  it  flows  down  hill  on  the  sur- 
face. It  fills  all  the  little  cavities  or  spaces  in  the  loose  rock  because 
of  the  pressure  due  to  the  weight  of  the  water. 

Now,  if  a  boring  is  made  from  the  surface  down  through  the  over- 
lying rock  layers  the  water  will  rise  in  this  opening  and  there  will  be 


FIG.  137.  Section  showing  Water  Supply  of  Deep  Artesian  Wells.    After  Upham. 

a  flowing  well.  How  rapidly  the  water  will  rise  above  the  ground  and 
flow  out  at  the  surface  or  how  high  it  will  rise  depends  upon  the  pressure 
or  "head"  which  the  water  has,  for  the  same  reason  that  the  height  of 
the  tower  on  which  the  water  tank  stands  in  a  city  determines  how 
rapid  a  stream  of  water  can  be  poured  from  a  hose  in  time  of  fire,  or 
how  high  a  stream  can  be  thrown,  or  how  high  it  can  be  made  to  run 
in  pipes  in  the  houses. 

Not  taking  into  account  the  friction  of  the  water  in  its  passage  in 
the  rocks  it  will  rise  as  high  as  the  source  or  collecting  ground  along 
the  foot  of  the  mountains  from  whence  it  comes.  But  it  will  not  ac- 
tually rise  nearly  as  high  because  of  the  friction,  but  we  may  think  of 
the  flow  from  an  artesian  well  being  determined  by  the  "head"  or 
height  of  the  land  where  the  rainwater  soaks  into  the  ground,  and  if 
this  is  a  good  deal  higher  than  the  surface  where  the  well  is  the  water 
will  flow  out  with  considerable  force,  but  if  it  is  not  much  higher  and  is 
a  long  distance  away  then  the  water  may  rise  only  part  way  in  the  bor- 
ing and  not  flow  out  at  all. 

There  must  be  a  layer  of  clay  or  shale  or  some  rock  through  which 
water  does  not  pass  readily  both  above  and  below  the  gravel  and  sand 
layer  or  else  the  water  would  soak  away  into  the  other  layers  of  rock 


260  THE   STORY   OF   THE    PRAIRIES. 

and  so  would  not  rise  in  the  boring  and  flow  out  at  the  surface.  There 
are,  therefore,  certain  conditions  necessary  for  an  artesian  well;  there 
must  be,  firstly,  a  collecting  ground  higher  than  the  surface  where  the 
boring  is  made;  secondly,  there  must  be  a  layer  of  rock  both  above  and 
below  the  layer  from  which  the  water  flows  through  which  water  can- 
not readily  pass;  and,  thirdly,  there  must  be  enough  difference  between 
the  height  of  the  collecting  ground  and  the  place  where  the  boring  is 
made  to  overcome  the  friction  or  resistance  to  the  passage  of  the  water. 

Deep  Artesian  Wells  West  of  the  Red  River  Valley. — The  artesian  wells 
at  Devils  Lake,  Jamestown,  Ellendale  and  Oakes,  and  a  large  number 
in  South  Dakota,  obtain  their  water  supply  from  the  Dakota  Sandstone 
by  deep  borings  through  the  overlying  formations.  The  borings  vary 
in  depth  from  less  than  one-fifth  of  a  mile  at  Oakes  to  more  than  one- 
third  of  a  mile  at  Devils  Lake  and  Jamestown.  These  pierce  through 
the  Fort  Pierre,  Niobrara  and  Fort  Benton  formations,  which  are 
mostly  shale  and  through  which  water  does  not  readily  pass. 

From  the  section  showing  the  formations  of  the  State  (Figure  in) 
it  will  be  seen  that  the  top  of  the  Dakota  Sandstone  in  the  northern 
portion  of  the  State  is  nearly  at  sea-level.  The  depot  at  Devils  Lake 
is  1,468  feet  above  the  level  of  the  sea,  and  the  surface  about  the  well 
is  six  or  eight  feet  higher.  The  depth  of  the  well  is  1,511  feet.  The 
boring  penetrates  eighty  feet  into  fine  white  sand.  The  top  of  the 
Dakota  Sandstone  is,  therefore,  at  this  point  about  forty-five  feet  above 
sea-level. 

The  depot  at  Jamestown  is  1,395  feet  above  sea-level,  and  the  well 
reaches  a  depth  of  1,476  feet,  penetrating  into  the  top  of  the  sand- 
stone. The  surface  about  the  well  is  about  eight  feet  below  the  depot. 
The  upper  part  of  the  Dakota  Sandstone  beneath  Jamestown  is  there- 
fore about  eighty-nine  feet  below  sea-level. 

Ellendale  is  1,449  ^eet  above  the  sea  and  the  well  penetrates  the 
Dakota  Sandstone  at  a  depth  of  1,087  feet>  so  tnat  the  upper  portion 
of  the  Dakota  Sandstone  at  this  place  is  362  feet  above  sea-level.  At 
Oakes  the  elevation  is  1,322  feet  and  the  Dakota  Sandstone  is  reached 
at  a  depth  of  944  feet,  so  that  the  Dakota  Sandstone  beneath  the  sur- 
face at  Oakes  is  378  feet  above  the  sea.  Farther  south  in  South  Da- 
kota the  sandstone  is  reached  at  still  less  depths,  showing  that  its  upper 
portion  is  nearer  the  surface  southward.  At  Vermilion  in  the  south- 
east corner  of  South  Dakota  the  sandstone  is  reached  at  323  feet  below 
the  surface,  or  818  feet  above  sea-level. 


THE    WATER    SUPPLY. 


261 


It  would,  therefore,  seem  that  artesian  wells  may  be  expected  to 
be  obtained  anywhere  over  the  central  and  eastern  portion  of  the  State, 
and  much  farther  west,  by  penetrating  to  the  depth  necessary  to  reach 
the  Dakota  Sandstone.  It  is  not  always  possible,  however,  to  get  a 
flow  of  water  even  when  the  general  conditions  are  such  as  to  warrant, 
the  expectation.  Sometimes  the  sandstone  is  pierced  in  a  place  where 
from  some  local  cause,  such  as  an  unusually  hard  place  in  the  sandstone 
rock,  the  water  is  not  able  to  pass  readily  through  the  rock  and  so 
cannot  rise  in  the  boring  with  force  enough  to  cause  a  flow. 

The  artesian  well  at  Grafton  penetrates  through  the  drift  to  a  depth 
of  298  feet,  but  instead  of  entering  the  Dakota  Sandstone  passes  next 
through  137  feet  of  limestone  belonging  to  the  Lower  Silurian  forma- 


TI^T^^ 


204 


FIG.  138.  Section  showing  the  Series  of  Artesian  Wells  from  Devils  Lake  and  Jamestown  southward 
to  Yankton  and  Vermilion.     Horizontal  scale,  90  miles  to  an  inch.     U.  S.  Geological  Survey. 

tion,  and  obtains  its  flow  of  water  from  a  sandstone  layer  still  lower 
in  the  Lower  Silurian  series.  The  well  had  a  depth  of  915  feet  when 
first  drilled,  a  small  flow  of  very  salt  water  being  obtained  at  a  depth 
of  898  feet,  from  a  sandstone  layer  next  to  the  Archaean  Granite.  The 
boring  was  filled,  however,  below  the  sandstone  layer  which  yields  the 
very  large  flow  of  brackish  water. 

A  section  of  the  rocks  passed  through  by  the  boring  is  shown  in 
Figure  76.  It  is  interesting  to  note  that  the  Dakota  Sandstone  was 
not  struck  at  all,  showing  that  this  sandstone  does  not,  in  this  part  of 
the  Red  River  Valley,  extend  as  far  east  as  this. 

Artesian  Wells  in  the  Red  River  Valley. — In  the  Red  River  Valley 
there  are  many  artesian  wells  which  range  in  depth  from  250  feet  to 
400  feet,  and  which,  'like  the  deep  wells  at  Devils  Lake,  Jamestown, 
Tower  City,  Oakes  and  Ellendale,  derive  their  water  supply  from  the 
far-distant  foothills  of  the  Rocky  Mountains. 

From  Blanchard  north  to  southern  Manitoba  most  of  the  artesian 
wells  are  of  this  class.  The  source  of  the  water  is  the  same  as  that  of 


262  THE    STORY    OF    THE    PRAIRIES. 

the  deep  wells  farther  west,  that  is,  the  Dakota  Sandstone.  To  obtain 
an  artesian  well,  therefore,  it  is  needful  to  penetrate  through  the  mass 
of  drift.  The  greater  part  of  the  material  of  the  deeper  portion 
of  the  floor  of  Lake  Agassiz  consists  of  boulder-clay  or  till.  Water 
cannot  pass  through  clay  much  more  readily  than  through  a  porcelain 
dish.  The  glacial  clay  has,  therefore,  to  be  drilled  through,  and  when 
the  sandstone  is  reached  a  flow  of  water  usually  results.  This  is  not 
always  the  case,  for  sometimes  the  sandstone  is  hard  and  compact,  so 
that  the  water  is  not  able  to  soak  through  it  readily,  and  so  it  is  not 
always  possible  to  obtain  an  artesian  well. 

The  drill  penetrates  through  a  few  feet  of  soil  and  fine  silt  and  soon 
enters  blue  clay.  Occasionally  there  are  layers  of  sand  and  gravel,  and 
large  boulders  are  sometimes  struck.  But  always  a  harder  layer  of 
clay  known  to  the  driller  as  "hard-pan"  is  found  at  the  bottom  of  the 
clay,  and  then  beyond  this  is  the  water-bearing  sandstone.  This  bot- 
tom "hard-pan"  is  the  part  of  the  drift  which  is  next  to  the  underlying 
rock,  and  is  always  passed  through  in  drilling  or  digging  wells  either 
in  the  Red  River  Valley  or  west  of  it  wherever  the  drift  lies  upon  the 
surface.  Several  wells  in  the  vicinity  of  Mayville  and  Blanchard,  and 
northward,  range  in  depth  from  300  to  400  feet,  water  being  obtained 
from  white  sandstone  just  below  the  hard-pan. 

Mineral  Substances  in  the  Water  of  Artesian  Wells. — The  water  from 
artesian  wells  in  North  Dakota  generally  contains  some  mineral  matter. 
That  from  some  wells  is  very  salt,  that  is,  it  contains  the  kind  of  salt 
we  use  in  our  food,  or  "common  salt."  .  Other  wells  contain  a  greater 
amount  of  salt,  but  do  not  taste  "salty"  or  like  brine;  they  contain  other 
kinds  of  salt.  Some  of  these  give  a  bitter  taste  to  the  water,  and  some- 
times the  water  is  a  bitter  brine,  and  still  other  salts  give  a  sparkling 
and  pleasant  taste  such  as  those  of  "hard"  waters  in  limestone  regions. 
Hard  limestone  waters  are  sometimes  called  "pure"  because  of  their 
clear  and  sparkling  character.  Such  waters  are  far  from  pure  though 
they  may  be  good  for  drinking  and  general  uses.  Some  wells  furnish 
water  that  is  soft  so  that  it  is  good  for  washing.  It  is  "soft"  because 
it  does  not  contain  those  salts  which  make  it  "hard,"  though  it  may 
contain  more  salts  of  other  kinds.  The  water  from  the  deep  well  at 
Devils  Lake  contains  seven  times  as  much  common  salt  (Sodium  Chlo- 
ride) and  three  and  a  half  times  as  much  Glauber's  salt  (Sodium  Sul- 
phate) as  the  water  from  the  Jamestown  well,  and  yet  the  water  from 
the  Devils  Lake  well  is  called  "soft." 


THE    WATER    SUPPLY.  263 

The  salts  which  are  in  the  lake  water  of  Devils  Lake  are  much  the 
same  as  those  which  are  in  the  water  of  the  artesian  well  at  Devils 
Lake  city.  The  waters,  therefore,  which  soak  into  the  ground  and 
become  the  source  of  the  artesian  well  600  or  700  miles  away  dissolve 
the  salts  from  the  rocks  through  which  they  pass,  in  a  similar  manner 
as  the  rains  falling  upon  the  ground  dissolve  the  salts  from  the  soil  and 
carry  them  into  the  lake. 

It  should  be  remembered  that  the  rocks  in  North  Dakota,  the  Cre- 
taceous formations,  were  deposited  in  a  great  inland  sea  or  ocean,  and 
ocean  waters  are  always  salt.  Our  artesian  waters  are,  therefore,  much 
like  the  sea  water  of  the  ancient  oceans. 

The  water  from  all  the  wells  is  not  the  same  because  it  does  not  all 
pass  through  the  same  kind  of  rock.  Wells,  therefore,  in  different 
localities  furnish  water  differing  in  quality.  Different  rock  layers  con- 
tain some  more  and  some  less  of  a  certain  kind  of  salt.  The  rain  water 
soaking  into  the  ground  and  passing  slowly  through  it  dissolves  out 
different  kinds  of  salt. 

Another  Class  of  Artesian  Wells. — There  is  another  class  of  artesian 
wells  in  the  Red  River  Valley  in  which  the  source  of  the  water  supply 
is  probably  not  the  same  as  that  of  the  deep  wells  west  of  the  valley 
and  the  wells  which  yield  salt  water  in  the  valley.  They  are  obtained  at 
depths  of  even  less  than  forty  feet  and  from  this  up  to  250  feet.  Some- 
times within  a  distance  of  only  a  few  rods  flowing  wells  are  obtained 
at  depths  varying  greatly,  and  the  water  in  the  wells  of  this  class  is  gen- 


Lt-oel   o$La.l<eAqa.S£i 

""' 


FIG.  139.   Section  showing  Water  Supply  of  Fresh  Artesian  Wells.     After  Upham. 

erally  fresh.  These  three  facts  distinguish  this  class  of  wells  from  those 
we  have  been  studying:  they  are  not  as  deep  as  those  just  described; 
they  vary  much  in  depth  within  short  distances;  and  the  water  contains 
generally  very  little  of  any  kind  of  salt. 

These  wells  do  not  derive  their  water  supply  from,  the  Dakota  Sand- 


264 


THE   STORY   OF   THE    PRAIRIES. 


FIG.  140.    Flowing  Well  and  Tanks,  Red  River  Valley. 


FIG.  141.     Flowing  Well,  One-half  Mile  North  of  Mooreton,  Richland  County. 


THE   WATER   SUPPLY. 


265 


FIG.  142     Flowing  Well,  Chaffee  Farm,  Casselton  Quadrangle.     (Depth  434  feet;  i.ooo 
barrels;  Section  33,  Township  138,  Range  53.) 


FIG.  143.    Flowing  well  One-half  Mile  North  of  Woods,  Cass  County. 


266 


THE    STORY    OF    THE    PRAIRIES. 


stone,  but  from  layers  of  sand  or  gravel  in  the.  drift.  The  mantle  of 
drift,  as  we  have  seen,  covers  the  underlying  rocks  over  most  of  the 
State  like  a  great  blanket,  but  much  thicker  or  deeper  in  some  places 
than  in  others.  Upon  a  large  part  of  the  Red  River  Valley  it  is  300  or 
more  feet  deep,  while  on  the  higher  lands  outside  the  valley  it  is  often 
not  more  than  fifteen  to  twenty-five  feet  deep.  We  have  seen  before 
that  the  drift  is  made  up  of  a  variety  of  materials — boulders,  gravel, 
sand  and  clay.  Wherever  the  surface  is  sandy  the  rainwater  soaks  in 
readily.  If  sandy  and  gravelly  layers  extend  for  long  distances  beneath 
the  surface  then  water  soaking  into  these  loose  beds  may  follow  along 
them  for  long  distances.  Thus  it  happens  that  water  which  falls  upon 
the  sandy  hills  and  rolling  prairies  may  be  carried  along  belts  of  gravel 


teo- 


600 


>i  -V-..".'i'.:'r.'>;:::;'»'ic«<-:t 

S^S /•£££?-:% 


.  'SAND,  - 


PIG.  144.  Diagram  indicating  the  probable  Relationship  of  Sources  of  Artesian  Water  at  Grandin. 

U.  S.  Geological  Survey. 

and  sand  to  lower  levels  in  the  Red  River  Valley.  Beds  of  gravel  and 
sand  serve  as  underground  water  courses  much  like  stream  beds  on  the 
surface. 

In  Figure  80  four  artesian  wells  located  at  Grandin,  Cass  County, 
are  represented  which  have  depths  of  105  feet,  158  feet,  187  feet  and 
248  feet.  These  wells  are  only  a  few  rods  apart,  and  the  water  from 
them  is  fresh,  containing  but  little  of  any  kind  of  salt.  It  is  good  for 
drinking  or  for  any  purpose.  The  water  of  these  wells,  as  of  many 
other  shallow  artesian  wells  in  the  Reel  River  Valley,  has  probably 
come  from  the  higher  land  west  of  the  valley  not  so  very  far  away 
where  the  soil  is  sandy  or  gravelly,  and  it  has  followed  the  loose  layers 
of  sand  and  gravel  which  extend  between  beds  of  clay,  down  to  the 


THE    WATER    SUPPLY.  267 

lower  valley,  and  thus  a  head  is  given  which  causes  the  flow  when  these 
"veins"  are  tapped  by  the  drill.  These  veins  are  probably  long,  nar- 
row beds  of  gravel  or  sand,  but  in  some  parts  of  the  valley  wells  are 
obtained  at  about  the  same  depths,  showing  that  the  beds  are  in  some 
places  not  long,  narrow  strips  of  gravel  or  sand,  but  wide  sheets.  Such 
shallow  artesian  wells  yielding  plenty  of  good  water  are  found  over  a 
large  part  of  the  southern  and  eastern  part  of  the  Red  River  Valley 
south  of  Blanchard,  and  north  to  Crookston  in  Minnesota. 

The  waters  are  fresh  because  they  have  not  passed  through  salty 
rock  layers  for  any  great  distance.  Waters  which  flow  underground  for 
long  distances  and  through  different  kinds  of  rocks  which  contain  salts 
are  salty  or  alkaline  because  there  are  many  salts  and  alkaline  sub- 
stances in  the  Cretaceous  formations,  and  the  waters  in  passing 
through  these  slowly  dissolve  the  mineral  substances  from  them. 

Common  Wells. — On  the  whole,  North  Dakota  has  an  abundant  sup- 
ply of  good,  wholesome  water.  Almost  anywhere  west  of  the  Red 
River  Valley,  which  means  nearly  the  whole  State  west  of  the  eastern 
tier  of  counties,  the  supply  of  water  from  surface  wells  is  abundant  and 
of  good  quality.  The  mantle  of  drift  over  the  underlying  shales  is  not 
so  deep  but  that  it  is  an  easy  matter  to  dig  or  drill  through  it,  and 
plenty  of  water  is  generally  obtained  as  soon  as  the  overlying  drift  is 
passed  through  at  depths  of  fifteen  to  seventy-five  feet.  The  writer 
thought  on  a  hot  afternoon  that  he  had  never  tasted  better  water  than 
the  clear,  sparkling  liquid  which  he  drew  from  an  old-fashioned  chain 
pump  at  a  rancher's  cottage  in  the  hill  country  south  of  Dog  Den  Butte 
in  McLean  County,  and  many  such  wells  dot  the  prairies  in  the  great 
interior  portion  of  the  State. 


268 


THE    STORY    OF    THE    PRAIRIES. 


FIG.  145.    Flowing  Well,  Just  Struck,  Trott  Farm,  Casselton  Quadrangle.    (Depth  418 
feet.    Flow  at  first,  4,000  barrels  per  day.    Section  10,  Township  140,  Range  53.) 


FIG.  146.    Old  Farm  Machinery  Buried  by  Sand  Thrown  Out  of  Budke  Artesian  Well, 

South  of  Wheatland. 


CHAPTER  THE  TWENTY-FIFTH. 
A  STUDY  OF  THE  SOILS. 

What  is  soil?  How  have  our  soils  been  formed?  What  is  the  dif- 
ference between  good  soil  and  poor  soil?  What  is  it  that  makes  one 
farm  worth  more  than, another  only  a  short  distance  away?  Why  are 
some  soils  naturally  rich  and  productive  while  others  are  in  their  natural 
condition  poor  and  can  be  made  to  produce  crops  only  by  great  care  in 
cultivation  and  often  by  considerable  expense  in  fertilizing?  These  are 
questions  of  vital  importance  to  the  practical  farmer.  They  are  all 
questions  that  he  can  answer,  and  upon  his  answer  to  them  may  depend 
much  of  his  success  in  farming. 

A  farmer  does  not  have  to  be  a  labeled  geologist  in  order  to  under- 
stand something  of  the  geology  of  soils.  Indeed  he  may  think  that  he 
does  not  understand  geology  at  all,  but  still  think  that  he  knows  some- 
thing about  soils,  their  structure,  texture,  and  qualities,  good  or  bad.  It 
may  very  likely  be  the  case  that  he  does  know  a  good  deal  about  soils, 
and  in  this  knowledge  he  probably  possesses  more  skill  in  geologic 
observation  than  he  has  supposed,  for  the  knowledge  of  soils  that  has 
most  to  do  with  their  productiveness,  and  hence  with  their  value,  is, 
after  all,  principally  geologic  knowledge. 

We  may,  therefore,  address  ourselves  to  the  study  of  the  geology  of 
soils  with  the  understanding  that  this  study  will  deal  with  those  facts 
and  principles  that  have  to  do  with  the  character  of  soils  in  their  rela- 
tion to  the  growth  of  plants.  The  structure,  texture,  and  composition 
of  soils  are  three  important  considerations.  Upon  these  depend  the  fer- 
tility and  productiveness  of  the  land.  No  one  of  these  considerations 
can  be  unfavorable  and  still  have  the  best  soil.  It  will  be  seen  that 
these  are  all  geological  considerations,  as  they  are  all  the  result  of 
geologic  processes.  The  best  method  of  treatment  of  any  soil  is,  there- 
fore, often  revealed  through  a  study  of  the  geological  factors  concerned 
in  the  production  of  the  soil. 

Definition — What  then  is  soil?  Geologically  it  is  rock.  Prac- 
tically it  is  material  in  which  plants  will  grow.  Let  us  look  at  a  hand- 
is  269 


270  THE    STORY    OF    THE    PRAIRIES. 

ful  of  soil  from  a  field  where  crops  have  been  grown  for  many  years. 
It  is  sometimes  spoken  of  as  dirt,  rich  dirt,  poor  dirt,  black  dirt,  yellow 
dirt,  brown  dirt,  etc.  Then  it  may  be  heavy  or  light,  hard  or  mellow, 
cold  or  quick.  These  are  all  terms  that  are  in  common  use  in  describing 
the  qualities  of  soils.  A  little  study  of  a  sample  of  soil  from  the  field 
will  show  that  these  qualities  are  all  determined  by  the  geologic  con- 
ditions under  which  the  soil  was  formed. 

Before  inquiring  as  to  the  causes  by  which  the  soil  has  come  to  be 
what  it  is  let  us  note  carefully  what  this  sample  contains,  or  in  other 
words,  let  us  see  of  what  it  is  composed.  As  soon  as  it  is  examined 
closely  it  is  seen  that  a  large  part  of  it  consists  of  small  particles  of 
stone,  tiny  rock  fragments,  that  are  just  like  large  boulders  that  we  have 
seen  except  in  the  matter  of  size.  Here  are  many  bits  that  look  like 
particles  of  broken  glass.  Then  there  are  other  particles  that  are  black 
or  dark,  some  rounded  in  form,  others  flat  like  thin  scales.  If  the  par- 
ticles are  examined  with  a  microscope  or  hand  magnifying  glass  they 
will  appear  much  like  the  boulders  that  lie  in  the  fields,  only  small.  If 
a  hundred  small  bits  are  picked  out  and  compared  with  the  same  num- 
ber of  pebbles  from  a  gravel  or  sand-pit  they  will  look  much  like  these 
except  that  the  soil  grains  are  smaller.  Put  a  handful  of  soil  in  a  tumbler 
of  water  and  stir  it  up.  What  happens?  In  a  few  i minutes  most  of 
the  soil  has  settled  to  the  bottom.  The  water,  however,  remains  roilly 
for  some  time.  Let  it  stand  24  hours  and  then  carefully  pour  off  this 
water  into  another  dish.  Put  in  more  clean  water  and  stir  again.  Allow 
to  settle  and  pour  off  as  before.  The  same  result  follows.  Repeat  the 
process  several  times.  After  the  soil  has  been  thus  thoroughly  rinsed 
what  remains  ?  Just  such  particles  as  those  that  were  picked  out  at  first. 
This  simple  experiment  shows  that  the  greater  part  of  the  soil  is  made 
up  of  small  bits  of  rock. 

Now  take  all  the  "dirty"  water  that  was  saved  from  the  washing 
and  let  it  stand  several  hours  in  a  glass  tumbler  or  bottle.  What  finally 
gathers  on  the  bottom?  Fine  mud.  Now  put  a  little  of  this  mud  on 
a  glass  and  look  at  it  with  a  good  microscope.  What  is  the  mud  made 
of? 

If  this  experiment  has  been  conducted  carefully  and  all  the  materials 
that  settled  to  the  bottom  are  weighed,  it  will  be  found  that  the  amount 
of  material  that  has  been  carried  off  in  the  water  is  indeed  very  small. 


A    STUDY    OF    THE    SOILS.  271 

What  then  do  you  conclude  that  the  soil,  as  you  see  it  in  the  field,  is 
principally  made  of? 

From  this  simple  study  of  a  handful  of  soil  it  appears  that  >  the 
greater  part  of  the  soil  is  small  particles  of  rock.  And  we  may  now 
ask  again  what  is  the  difference  in  soils  that  makes  some  worth  so  much 
more  than  others,  if  after  all  the  soil  is  largely  made  up  of  small  bits  of 
rock?  A  little  further  study  of  soils  in  the  field  will  help  to  make  this 
matter  clear.  Every  one  has  seen  gravelly  soil,  and  sandy  soil,  and  soil 
that  is  neither  gravelly  nor  sandy  but  just  good  every  day  soil.  Such  a 
sample  was  that  we  studied  when  the  experiment  was  made.  Then  there 
are  also  soils  that  are  heavy  and  compact,  called  clayey  soils.  Of  these 
classes  of  soils  those  that  are  gravelly  or  sandy  are  not  considered  the 
best  for  farming  pursuits.  They  are  too  much  affected  by  drought, 
among  other  things.  The  clayey  soil  is  too  compact,  becoming  hard  in 
the  sun,  and  unsuited  to  the  growth  of  plants.  In  one  case  the  rock 
particles  of  which  the  soil  is  composed  are  too  coarse,  and  in  the  other 
they  are  too  fine.  The  one  lets  the  water  soak  in  and  disappear  too 
rapidly;  the  other  holds  the  water  too  long.  The  latter  class  of  soils  is 
too  heavy;  the  former  class  is  too  light.  Just  the  right  mixture  of  the 
clayey  and  sandy  materials  would  make  the  best  soil,  and  this  in  fact 
is  the  most  valuable  class  of  soils  in  the  world,  the  mixture  of  clay  and 
sand,  called  loam. 

Origin  of  Soils — Since  the  small  particles  of  rock  of  which  the 
soils  are  so  largely  composed  are  seen  to  be  just  like  the  larger  stones 
in  the  field  except  that  they  differ  in  size,  it  may  very  naturally  be  asked 
where  these  tiny  bits  of  rock  have  come  from  that  make  up  the  soils  of 
the  field.  This  is  an  important  question,  and  in  order  to  understand  it, 
it  will  be  necessary  to  know  something  of  the  processes  by  which  soils 
have  been  formed.  This  means  that  it  will  be  needful  to  inquire  how 
the  rocks  become  broken  up  into  small  fragments. 

We  may  consider  now  two  ways  by  which  the  rocks  are  broken  up. 
One  is  by  the  actiori  of  frost,  wind,  heat,  and  rain.  This  is  called  the 
process  of  weathering.  The  other  is  that  of  mechanical  breaking,  in 
which  the  rocks  are  broken  by  some  mechanical  force  that  strikes  one 
rock  against  another,  or  some  substance  strikes  the  rocks  so  as  to  break 
them. 

Both  these  processes  have  been  at  work  in  forming  the  soils  of 
our  prairies  and  fields.  The  weathering  of  rocks  is  going  on  all  the 


272 


THE    STORY    OF    THE    PRAIRIES. 


time  all  around  us,  slowly  it  may  be,  but  it  is  going  on.  New  soil  is 
being  formed  all  the  time  from  the  rocks.  All  the  streams  are  working 
away  carrying  fine  particles  of  soil  down  stream  from  the  lands  toward 
the  sea.  The  finer  parts  of  the  soil  are  continually  being  carried  away, 
and  if  it  were  not  that  more  soil  is  being  formed  to  take  the  place  of 
that  which  is  carried  away  the  fields  would  by  and  by  become  very 
thinly  covered  with  soil,  and  in  time  there  would  be  only  bare  rock 
left. 

The  mechanical  processes,  by  which  rocks  are  broken,  crushed,  and 


FIG.  147.    Clay  Butte,  Capped  with  Sandstone.     Yields  soil  containing  stones.    ^Township 
149,  Range  96.)    Photograph  by  Rex  Willard. 

ground  to  fine  powder,  are  closely  related  to  rock  weathering,  and  are 
among  the  most  important  soil  forming  processes.  One  of  the  most 
stupendous  things  that  has  ever  occurred  to  chan'ge  the  face  of  the 
landscape  is  that  known  as  glaciation,  or  the  movement  of  a  great  ice 
sheet  over  the  land,  by  which  rocks  were  broken,  crushed,  and  ground 
to  fine  powder.  At  the  same  time  they  were  often  carried  long  dis- 
tances and  so  were  mixed  and  stirred,  so  that  when  the  ice  finally  melted 
the  material  was  left  in  piles  large  or  small,  and  scattered  over  large 
areas.  By  this  process  a  great  variety  of  soils  was  deposited  upon  the 


A    STUDY    OF    THE    SOILS. 


273 


landscape,  and  this  transported  material,  broken,  crushed,  and  ground 
up  to  all  degrees  of  fineness  frorii  large  boulders  to  fine  sand  and  clay, 
now  makes  up  the  great  body  of  soil  of  many  of  our  northern  states. 

This  work  done  by  ice  in  fashioning  and  changing  the  landscape 
and  modifying  its  soils  belongs  to  that  part  of  the  earth's  history  which 
is  known  as  the  Glacial  Period.  The  work  that  was  done  by  the  ice 
during  this  period,  and  the  forms  in  which  the  landscape  was  left  after 
the  ice  had  melted,  has  been  described  in  the  earlier  chapters  of  this 
book.  Re-read  chapters  three  and  five,  having  in  mind  the  effect  of  the 


FIG.  148.    Clay  Butte.     Yields  soil  free  from  stones.     (Township  149,  Range  96.) 
Photograph  by  Rex  Willard. 

things  described  upon  the  soil,  and  you  will  probably  be  convinced  that 
this  has  been  one  of  the  greatest  factors  in  making  North  Dakota  soils 
what  they  are. 

Kinds    of    Rock    from    which    Soils    are    Derived From    what    has 

been  said  it  will  be  apparent  that  the  particular  kind  of  soil  is  determ- 
ined in  considerable  measure  by  the  kind  of  rock  that  was  weathered 
or  mechanically  broken  up  to  form  the  soil.  The  chemist  finds  that  soils 
differ  very  much  in  composition,  or  the  kind  of  substances  of  which 
they  are  composed.  For  example,  limestone  rock  when  weathered  or 


274 


,THE    STORY    OF    THE    PRAIRIES. 


broken  and  ground  up  will  form  a  soil  which  will  be  composed  of  very 
different  substances  from  soil  formed  by  weathering  or  grinding  up  of 
shale,  or  of  quartz  rock.  And  since  these  kinds  of  rock  differ  very 
greatly  in  hardness  the  texture  of  the  soil,  by  which  is  meant  the 
coarseness  or  fineness  of  the  grain,  will  differ  very  much.  Soil  formed 
from  limestone  will  be  very  different  from  soil  formed  from  shale  or 
quartz  rock  not  only  in  the  sizes  of  the  little  grains  or  particles  of  rock 
of  which  it  is  made  up  but  it  will  differ  also  in  chemical  composition. 
So  also  soil  formed  from  shale  will  differ  from  that  formed  from  lime- 
stone or  quartz,  and  soil  formed  from  quartz  will  differ  from  the  others 


FIG.  149.    Morainic  Lake  Filling  with  Vegetable  Matter.    (Muskrat  house  in  center.) 

both  in  texture  and  in  chemical  composition.  And  since  both  the  chemi- 
cal composition  and  the  texture  of  the  soil  makes  a  difference  in  the 
fertility,  or  in  the  value  of  the  soil  for  plant  growth,  the  amount  of  each 
kind  of  rock  that  entered  into  its  formation  becomes  a  very  important 
matter. 

Thus  we  shall  find  ourselves  driven  back  to  the  geology  of  the  orig- 
inal rocks  from  which  our  soils  have  been  formed  in  order  to  find  out 
their  nature.  In  the  Seventh  and  Twentieth  chapters  something  is  said 
about  the  ages  of  the  rocks  in  North  Dakota,  and  the  conditions  under 
which  these  rocks  were  formed.  Not  all  limestones,  nor  all  shales,  nor 


A    STUDY    OF    THE    SOILS.  275 

all  quartzites,  are  alike  in  their  manner  of  formation,  and  all  are  not 
made  of  the  same  substances.  The  soils  that  are  formed  from  the 
weathering  or  the  mechanical  breaking  and  grinding  of  these  rocks 
therefore  are  not  the  same.  Whether  a  particular  farm  is  good  for  the 
raising  of  wheat,  or  whether  or  not  the  soil  contains  alkali,  may  depend 
upon  the  conditions  that  existed  in  the  ancient  seas  upon  the  bottom 
of  which  these  rocks  were  originally  laid  down  as  sediments. 

The  materials  that  lie  at  or  near  the  surface  in  North  Dakota  east 
of  the  Missouri  River  are  often  spoken  of  as  drift.  The  shale  or  clay 
or  sandstone  that  lies  beneath  the  drift  is  called  the  underlying  rock. 
The  story  of  the  drift  has  been  told  in  earlier  pages  of  this  book.  The 
history  of  the  underlying  rock  also  has  been  given  in  Chapters  Seven 
and  Twenty.  The  drift  has  been  explained  to  have  been  derived 
largely  from  the  underlying  rock  in  the  vicinity  where  the  drift  occurs. 
This  means  that  the  drift  is  rock  that  has  been  mechanically  broken, 
pulverized,  and  mixed  by  the  action  of  the  great  ice  sheet. 

Soluble  Salts  or  Alkali — Let  us  first  consider  the  materials  of  the 
soil  which  may  be  dissolved  in  water.  These  are  often  spoken  of  as 
the  soluble  salts  of  the  soil.  They  are  also  frequently  called  "alkali." 
The  subject  of  alkaline  waters  in  lakes,  and  the  origin  of  the  alkali  in 
the  rocks  of  the  ancient  sea  bottoms,  is  explained  elsewhere  in  this  book. 

Probably  all  the  soils  in  North  Dakota  contain  alkali.  In  fact, 
while  many  farmers  are  afraid  of  'alkali'  land  as  not  being  productive, 
still  these  mineral  salts  are  necessary  for  the  food  of  plants,  and  it  is 
only  when  they  are  present  in  too  great  quantities  that  they  become 
injurious  to  growing  crops.  The  best  methods  of  cultivation  for  alkali 
lands,  and  the  cause  of  there  being  too  much  alkali  in  the  soil,  will  be 
considered  later  when  the  different  types  of  soil  are  considered.  It  is 
important  now  to  understand  what  is  the  source  of  the  alkali,  and  the 
natural  relation  of  these  mineral  salts  to  the  soil.  Since  the  alkalies  have 
been  derived  from  the  waters  of  the  ancient  seas  upon  the  bottom  of 
which  the  rocks,  from  which  the  soils  have  been  formed,  were  deposited 
as  muds  or  sediments,  and  since  the  character  of  the  soil,  as  sandy, 
clayey,  gravelly,  etc.,  has  been  largely  determined  by  the  action  of  the 
great  ice  sheet  in  forming  the  drift  over  a  great  part  of  the  land,  it  fol- 
lows that  the  study  of  the  alkalies  in  the  soils  takes  us  into  a  study  of 
the  origin  of  the  soils  and  the  processes  by  which  the  particular  soil  type 
has  arisen.  The  cure  for  a  disease  is  often  most  certainly  found  out  by 


276 


THE    STORY    OF    THE    PRAIRIES. 


learning  the  cause  of  the  disease.  When  we  know  the  causes  that  have 
led  to  alkali  being  present  in  the  land  we  are  on  the  right  road  to  find  a 
way  to  overcome  the  trouble,  if  indeed  there  is  any  way  to  overcome 
it. 

Organic  Matter  in  Soil — The  organic  matter  in  soils  is  one  of  the 
very  important  considerations  relating  to  soil  fertility.  Organic  matter 
in  the  soil  may  be  described  as  partially  decayed  remains  of  plant  and 
animal  matter.  If  a  boulder  of  granite  be  broken  up  and  ground  to 
fine  powder  and  wet  with  rain  water  it  will  be  found  that  plants  will 


FIG.  150.    Soil  Survey  Party  in  Camp.    Photograph  by  The  Author. 

grow  in  this  soil.  This  would  be  soil  formed  by  mechanical  breaking 
and  grinding  in  very  fact.  But  if  some  kind  of  decayed  matter,  such  as 
old  leaves  or  rotted  green  plants,  are  mixed  in  the  soil  this  adds  greatly 
to  the  fertility  of  the  soil. 

It  should  be  borne  in  mind  that  substances  in  the  earth  that  dis- 
solve in  water  will  rise  from  considerable  depths  due  to  the  process  of 
capillarity.  In  other  words  as  the  rain  waters  soak  into  the  earth  the 
salts  become  dissolved  in  the  water,  and  as  the  surface  of  the  ground 
becomes  dry  the  water  rises  from  below,  bringing  the  salts  with  it. 


A    STUDY    OF    THE    SOILS  277 

Then  the  water  dries  off  from  the  surface  by  evaporation  and  the  salts 
are  left. 

This  rising  of  the  salts  from  the  subsoils  goes  on  in  all  our  fields. 
It  may  not  do  any  harm,  because  it  may  be  washed  away  from  the 
surface  so  that  too  much  does  not  gather.  On  the  other  hand  there 
may  be  too  much  washing  of  the  surface,  and  not  only  the  salts  that 
rise  from  the  deeper  subsoils  may  be  washed  away,  but  the  organic 
matter  that  comes  from  the  decay  of  roots  and  leaves  and  stems,  which 
add  fertility  to  the  soil,  may  also  be  washed  away.  The  salts  that 
come  to  the  surface  through  the  rising  of  the  ground  water  and  the  or- 
ganic substances  that  gather  from  the  growth  and  decay  of  living 
things  are  valuable  ingredients  of  the  soil. 

How  a  Soil  Survey  is  Made — It  may  be  of  interest  to  the  reader 
to  know  how  a  soil  map  is  made.  The  work  of  soil  surveying,  like  any 
other  investigation  of  a  scientific  nature,  requires  patience,  perseverance, 
and  skill.  Soil  surveying  depends  upon  the  judgment  of  the  one  doing 
the  work  rather  than  upon  the  accurate  use  of  ipechanical  instru- 
ments, as  in  land  surveying.  The  instruments  that  the  soil  surveyor 
finds  the  greatest  use  for  are  his  eyes  and  his  fingers,  in  other  words 
the  skillful  use  of  his  senses  of  sight  and  feeling.  To  be  sure  he  uses 
instruments  for  certain  parts  of  the  work,  but  what  he  seeks  to  do  is  to 
use  his  senses  in  such  manner  that  he  can  form  a  correct  judgment  of 
the  character  of  the  soil  as  to  its  structure,  texture,  and  quality. 

Making  a  Soil  Map — The  soil  map  is  made  by  representing  the 
different  soil  types,  in  colors,  using  one  color  for  each  type  of  soil.  A 
map  drawn  on  a  large  scale  is  used,  and  the  colors  for  each  type  are  ap- 
plied in  the  field  section  by  section  as  the  work  progresses.  .  Samples 
of  the  soils  and  subsoils  from  different  parts  of  the  area  are  sent  to 
Washington  to  be  analyzed  in  the  laboratories  of  the  Bureau  of  Soils. 
Several  samples  are  taken  of  each  soil  type,  and  these  are  analyzed  with 
much  care  by  very  delicate  methods.  The  analyses  show  accurately 
just  the  amount  of  clay,  silt,  sand  of  different  grades  of  fineness,  the 
amount  of  organic  matter,  and  the  chemical  constituents.  These  things 
can  be  determined  in  the  field  by  an  experienced  man  with  a  fair  degree 
of  accuracy,  but  the  analysis  in  the  laboratory  shows  exactly  the  amount 
of  each  kind  of  material  in  the  sample. 

The  soil'  map  when  completed  shows  every  section  of  land  on  the 
area,  and  the  kind  of  soil  and  subsoil  on  every  part  of  each  section 


278  THE    STORY    OF    THE    PRAIRIES. 

down  to  areas  as  small  as  10  acres.  This  map  is  sent  to  Washington 
along  with  the  written  report  of  the  surveyor  who  had  charge  of  the 
work.  The  report  gives  a  full  and  detailed  description,  of  each  soil 
type  and  the  agricultural  conditions.  The  written  report  and  the  col- 
ored map  and  the  samples  are  all  carefully  gone  over  in  Washington  by 
members  of  the  staff  of  soil  experts,  and  then  the  final  report  is  ready 
for  publication. 

This  is  the  method  that  has  been  used  by  the  men  who  have  made 
the  several  soil  surveys  in  North  Dakota.  Reports  containing  the  col- 
ored maps,  the  results  of  the  analyses  of  the  various  soil  samples,  and 
the  descriptions  of  the  soils,  and  of  the  agricultural  conditions,  have 
been  published  and  distributed  to  the  public.  These  surveys  made  in 
different  parts  of  the  state  have  made  it  possible  to  classify  the  soils  of 
the  state,  and  have  formed  the  basis  for  the  soil  map  which  accompa- 
nies this  volume. 

The  Soil  Regions — The  soils  of  North  Dakota  may  be  classified 
in  a  general  way  by  the  character  of  the  regions  where  they  occur. 
There  are  three  great  soil  regions  in  the  state,  and  each  differs  in  import- 
ant particulars  from  the  others  because  of  different  conditions  that 
have  prevailed  in  each  region.  These  three  regions  are  the  level  lake 
bottom  lands,  of  which  a  good  example  is  the  Red  River  Valley ;  the 
rolling  prairie  region  which  has  been  transformed  and  fashioned  to  a 
large  extent  by  the  action,  of  the  great  ice  sheet,  in  which  region  is 
included  the  large  basins  of  the  Sheyenne  and  James  rivers;  and  the 
regions  where  the  land  has  not  been  affected  by  glaciation,  west  of  the 
Missouri  River,  and  where  the  high  plain  has  long  been  subject  to  the 
agencies  of  weathering  and  erosion,  and  the  land  dissected  by  streams. 

If  these  three  regions  be  compared  in  a  little  further  detail  it  will 
be  observed  that  the  geological  conditions  which  have  prevailed  in  each 
region  have  been  very  different,  and  the  present  soil  conditions  in  each 
of  the  three  regions  are  very  different  as  a  result.  The  territory  lying 
west  of  the  Missouri  River  gives  some  suggestion  of  what  the  character 
of  the  landscape  would  have  been  over  all  the  state  if  the  invasion  of  ice 
of  the  Glacial  Period  had  not  occurred.  The  conditions  today  in  the 
Red  River  Valley  and  the  Mouse  River  Valley  are  what  they  are  because 
when  the  ice  of  the  great  continental  ice  sheet  began  to  melt  away  great 
floods  of  water  accumulated  in  the  lower  places  forming  large  lakes,  and 
the  sediment  that  was  borne  into  these  bodies  of  water  by  streams 


A    STUDY    OF    THE    SOILS. 


279 


from  the  great  melting  mass  was  assorted  and  arranged  upon  their  bot- 
toms, and  the  present  soils  of  the  level  prairies  where  were  once  the 
still  deep  waters  are  the  result. 

Now,  each  of  these  three  great  regions  includes  smaller  regions  that 
have  soils  peculiar  to  the  special  conditions  that  exist  in  these  particular 
places.  It  will  be  seen  presently  when  the  different  classes  and  types  of 
soil  are  considered  that  certain  types  occur  wherever  a  given  set  of  con- 
ditions existed.  These  conditions  have  been  studied  elsewhere  in  this 


FIG.  151.    Sun  Cracks  in  Muddy  Bottom  of  Missouri  River,  near  Williston. 
Photograph  by  Rex  Wtilard. 

book  in  connection  with  the  geologic  history  of  the  different  regions. 
Now  it  will  be  the  soils  as  they  exist  today  that  will  claim  our  attention. 
Soils  of  the  Glacial  Lakes — The  soils  formed  from  sediments  de- 
posited on  the  bottoms  of  ancient  lakes,  such  as  Glacial  Lakes  Agassiz, 
Souris,  Sargent,  and  Dakota,  constitute  what  is  here  called  the  lacustrine 
or  Lake  Agassiz  series.  These  soils  fall  into  two  general  groups,  viz., 
those  that  are  finer  in  texture,  which  were  deposited  in  the  central  deeper 
still  waters  of  the  ancient  lakes,  and  those  which  are  coarser  in  texture 
that  were  deposited  nearer  shore  and  were  washed  and  assorted  by  the 


280 


THE    STORY    OF    THE    PRAIRIES. 


waves  and  off-shore  currents.  These  groups  of  soils  are  represented  on 
the  accompanying  soil  map,  and  embrace  several  clay  loam  types  and 
several  sandy  or  gravelly  loam  types.  Just  what  is  meant  by  the  terms 
loam,  clay  loam,  sand,  sandy  loam,  etc.,  will  be  explained  later  when 
the  various  soil  types  represented  on  the  map  are  considered. 

It  will  be  observed  on  the  soil  map  that  the  soil  types  in  these  regions 
lie  in  tracts  that  are  longer  north  and  south  and  comparatively  narrow 
east  and  west.  The  regions  traversed  by  the  Red  River  of  the  North 
and  the  Mouse  River  are  the  axial  portions  of  the  ancient  lake  bottoms 


FIG.     152.    Wind-Blown  Sand,  Bottoms  Missouri  River,  near  Williston. 
Photograph  by  Rex  Wtllard. 

across  which  these  streams  now  sluggishly  meander.  The  parts  of  the 
great  glacial  lakes  Agassiz  and  Souris  that  lay  in  the  United  States  had 
their  longer  axes  in  a  north-south  direction.  The  deepest  portions  of 
the  lakes  were  in  these  axial  regions.  The  shores  were  in  a  general  way 
parallel  with  these1  deeper  axial  lines  where  now  extend  the  sluggish  Red 
and  Mouse  Rivers.  In  these  deepest  central  parts  of  those  great  lakes 
the  finest  sediments  were  deposited,  and  in  these  regions  as  a  result 
now  occur  the  heavy  clay  and  clay  loam  soils.  Farther  toward  the 
shores  the  sediments  deposited  were  slightly  coarser,  but  they  were 


A    STUDY    OF    THE    SOILS. 


281 


quite  uniformly  fine-grained  sediments  consisting  mostly  of  such  fine 
rock  powder  as  silt  or  clay.  At  the  margins  of  these  great  bodies  of 
water,  however,  materials  much  coarser  in  character  were  deposited, 
and  the  change  from  the  one  to  the  other  is  often,  though  not  always, 
quite  abrupt.  Here  were  deposited  the  coarser  sands  and  gravels 
brought  down  by  the  streams  or  thrown  into  the  lakes  directly  from  the 
melting  glacier  after  these  materials  had  been  washed  and  assorted  by 
the  waves  and  currents.  It  thus  comes  about  that  the  several  soil  types 
are  distributed  in  belts  running  north  and  south. 


FIG.  153.    Four  Sisters,  Each  Holding  a  "Claim,"  Williams  County. 
Photograph  by  H.  V.  Hibburd. 

The  division  df  all  the  soil  types  of  the  lacustrine  or  Lake  Agassiz 
series  into  two  groups,  those  formed  from  the  deep  water  deposits, 
called  the  clay  loam  group,  and  those  formed  from  the  shore  deposits, 
called  the  sandy  loam  group,  is  therefore  a  natural  one.  The  division  is, 
however,  somewhat  arbitrary,  since  it  is  often  impossible  to  tell  just 
where  the  one  begins  and  the  other  ends. 

In  the  former  group  are  included  three  principal  soil  types,  as  deter- 
mined by  the  United  States  Bureau  of  Soils,  two  of  which  are  classi- 
fied as  clays  and  one  as  clay  loam.  The  latter  group  includes  seven 


282 


THE    STORY    OF    THE    PRAIRIES. 


different  soil  types,  as  they  have  been  mapped  in  critical  soil  surveys, 
but  these  are  all  included  in  the  grades  between  loam  and  sanely  or 
gravelly  loam,  and  the  shore  soils  may  therefore  for  geneial  purposes 
be  represented  by  two  forms,  viz.,  loam  and  sandy  loam. 

It  will  thus  be  seen  that  the  soil  types  in  the  lacustrine  or  Lake 
Agassiz  series  embrace  soils  ranging  in  texture  from  clay,  in  the  axial 
or  central  deep  water  portion  of  the  lake  bottoms  through  clay  loam, 
loam,  sandy  loam,  to  gravelly  loam,  and  that  these  represent  no  less 
than  ten  different  soil  types  when  critically  analyzed,  but  that  these  may 


FIG.  154.    The  Four  "Claims"  of  the  Four  Sisters,  Williams  County. 
Photograph  by  H.  Y.  Hibbard. 

be  divided  into  two  general  groups,  the  clay  loam  group  on  the  one  hand 
and  the  sandy  loam  group  on  the  other. 

Soils  of  the  Rolling  Prairies — In  the  great  rolling  prairie  district 
several  types  of  soil  occur,  but  they  fall  mostly  into  two  series.  Three 
or  four  phases  of  the  landscape  include  all  the  principal  soil  types.  ( i ) 
The  more  roughly  rolling  hills  or  moraines,  (2)  the  broadly  rolling 
prairie  with  gentle  swells  and  extensive  nearly  level  tracts,  and  (3)  the 
places  where  running  waters  (mostly  from  the  melting  ice  sheet)  have 
modified  the  soils  by  washing  and  re-depositing  them,  represent  the 


A    STUDY    OF    THE    SOILS.  283 

most  important  phases  of  the  landscape  that  find  expression  in  the 
different  soil  types.  Lowland  tracts  occur  also  among  the  hills  of  the 
rolling  prairie,  and  these  often  constitute  distinct  soil  types. 

One  of  the  principal  series  of  soils  in  the  rolling  prairie  portion  of 
North  Dakota  is  known  as  the  Marshall  series.  The  Marshall  series 
includes  a  number  of  different  types,  in  fact  there  is  almost  a  complete 
series  from  the  clay  types  to  coarse  sand  and  gravel  represented  in  the 
rolling  prairies  of  North  Dakota.  In  the  morainic  hilly  regions  there  is 
commonly  either  Marshall  stony  loam  or  Marshall  sandy  or  gravelly 
loam.  One  of  the  most  widely  distributed  and  most  valuable  soil  types 
in  the  state  is  that  known  as  Marshall  loam.  Marshall  silt  loam  is  one 
that  occurs  also  over  quite  large  areas,  and  this  is  also  a  most  excellent 
soil.  Some  of  the  best  land  for  cereal  grains,  such  as  wheat,  oats,  bar- 
ley, and  the  like,  is  Marshall  silt  loam.  Marshall  loam  is  an  excellent 
soil  for  general  farming  purposes.  It  differs  from  Marshall  silt  loam 
chiefly  in  having  a  little  larger  percentage  of  sand  and  a  smaller  per- 
centage of  silt.  Marshall  clay  loam  and  Marshall  clay  are  two  types  that 
occur,  but  not  over  as  wide  areas  as  the  loam  and  silt  loam  just  men- 
tioned. Clay  loam  and  clay  are  heavier  soils,  and  generally  require  arti- 
ficial drainage  to  make  the  lands  most  fully  productive. 

All  the  types  of  the  Marshall  series  are  soils  that  have  been  formed 
directly  from  material  that  has  been  transported  or  ploughed  up  and 
ground  to  powder  by  the  great  ice  sheet.  The  soils  of  the  terminal 
moraines  and  of  the  ground  moraines  therefore  generally  belong  to  the 
Marshall  series.  The  soils  that  have  been  deposited  from  running  water 
along  the  stream  courses  are  not  classed  in  the  Marshall  series.  The 
conditions  under  which  they  have  been  formed  are  quite  different  from 
those  of  the  Marshall  series,  and  so  the  resulting  structure  of  the  soil  is* 
quite  different. 

The  Marshall  series  consists  of  soils  that  have  been  formed  by  the 
action  of  the  sun,  rain,  wind,  frost,  and  other  natural  agencies,  from  the 
materials  that  were  left  when  the  great  ice  sheet  melted.  The  Sioux 
series  includes  those  soils  that  have  been  formed  from  materials  of  the 
drift  that  have  been  worked  over  by  running  water  from  the  melting 
ice.  The  soils  of  the  Sioux  series  are  generally  dark  colored,  with  a  sub- 
soil of  gravel  or  sand.  These  soils  occur  in  the  bottoms  of  valleys  like 
the  Sheyenne,  the  James,  the  Pipestem,  the  Des  Lacs,  the  upper  Mouse, 


284  THE    STORY    OF    THE    PRAIRIES. 

and  along  many  ancient  channels  that  are  tributary  to  the  Missouri 
River  from  the  east. 

The  Clyde  series  is  another  important  series  of  prairie  soils.  These 
consist  of  soils  that  are  of  glacial  origin,  but  they  differ  from  those  of 
the  Marshall  series  in  that,  while  they  have  been  formed  from  materials 
left  by  the  melting  of  the  great  ice  sheet,  they  have  been  modified  by  the 
action  of  the  ice  waters.  They  are  distinguished  from  the  Sioux  series 
also  in  that,  while  they  have  been  modified  by  the  action  of  the  glacial 
waters,  they  have  not  been  deposited  along  stream  channels  but  have 
been  re-worked  by  glacial  flood  waters  and  deposited  in  ponds  or  lakes 
of  still  waters.  The  soils  of  this  series  are  often  dark  in  color  from  the 
large  amount  of  organic  matter  that  they  contain.  The  Sioux  soils  are 
generally  well  drained  naturally  by  reason  of  the  fact  that  they  are 
underlain  by  coarse  gravel  or  sand  as  a  subsoil,  while  the  subsoil  of  the 
Clyde  series  is  generally  a  quite  compact  clay,  gray,  yellow,  or  mottled 
in  color.  The  Clyde  soils  are  therefore  often  heavy  in  texture,  and  re- 
quire artificial  drainage  to  make  them  most  fully  productive.  These 
soils  occur  in  the  low  areas  among  the  rolling  hills  and  broad  swells  of 
the  ground  moraine. 

Soils  West  of  the  Missouri  River. — West  of  the  Missouri  River 
a  different  set  of  soil  conditions  exists  from  those  of  any  other  part  of 
the  state.  Here  the  great  ice  sheet  did  not  go.  No  such  great  change 
has  been  wrought  upon  the  landscape  as  that  which  has  affected  all  the 
land  east  of  the  river.  Upon  any  good  map  of  the  state  it  will  be 
observed  that  there  are  more  streams  than  in  any  other  region  of  the 
state,  and  no  lakes.  East  of  the  river  are  comparatively  few  streams 
and  very  many  lakes.  Any  one  who  has  traveled  in  that  part  of  the 
state  has  observed  that  the  appearance  of  the  whole  landscape  is  differ- 
ent. The  hills  are  different  in  form  and  different  in  structure,  that  is, 
they  are  different  in  the  way  they  are  made  and  in  the  materials  they  are 
made  of.  Here  the  hills  are  flat  topped,  or  may  be  craggy  and  rough 
from  projecting  rough  rocks,  while  east  of  the  river  they  are  rounded 
in  form,  and  often  strewn  with  boulders  of  many  different  kinds  of 
rock.  West  of  the  river  there  are  few  glacial  boulders.  (a)  When  the 
hills  are  strewn  with  rock  or  capped  with  crags  the  rock  is  always  of  the 
same  kind  as  that  of  which  the  hills  are  composed.  The  boulders  in  the 

(a)  This  statement  is  a  general  one.    See  "The  Older  and  Newer  Drift,"  Chapter 
Twenty-one. 


A    STUDY    OF    THE    SOILS.  285 

rolling  country  east  of  the  river  are  of  different  kinds,  and  none  of  them 
are  like  the  rock  of  which  the  hills  are  composed.  The  boulders  are  of 
glacial  origin,  or  drift  boulders.  There  is  no  drift  after  passing  40  to 
50  miles  west  of  the  Missouri  River,  and  the  rocks  that  lie  upon  the 
surface  are  fragments  that  have  been  broken  from  the  underlying  rock 
which  was  originally  formed  there,  and  is  the  rock  that  lies  underneath 
the  soil  of  the  whole  region.  The  soils  in  these  western  counties  are 
known  as  residual  soils  as  distinguished  from  the  glacial  or  drift  soils 
of  the  rolling  prairie  regions. 

The  soils  west  of  the  Missouri  River  are  called  residual  soils  be- 
cause they  are  the  result  of  the  action  of  the  sun,  frost,  wind,  and  rain 
upon  the  rocks  of  which  the  landscape  was  originally  made.  This  is 
the  meaning  of  residual  as  compared  with  drift,  the  drift  soils  being 
those  that  have  "drifted"  from  some  other  place,  or  have  been  trans- 
ported by  the  great  ice  plough. 

The  rock  layers  of  which  the  landscape  west  of  the  Missouri  River 
is  made  are  mostly  sandstones,  shales  and  clays.  Under  the  action  of 
the  weathering  processes  these  break  up  into  sand  and  clay,  some  harder 
portions  remaining  as  "rocks"  or  "stones"  lying  upon  the  surface  or  in  the 
soil.  If  the  sandstone  rock  in  any  region  is  very  hard  there  are  apt  to  be 
many  fragments  or  hard  pieces  lying  upon  the  surface,  and  this  is  called 
stony  land.  In  such  a  region  of  hard  rock  there  are  apt  to  be  also  hills 
capped  with  hard  rough  crags  of  sandstone.  Many  times  also  there 
will  be  flat-topped  hills  or  buttes,  a  hard  layer  of  rock  serving  as  a  cap 
or  protecting  cover.  If,  however,  the  sandstone  in  a  .region  is  easily 
broken  up,  becoming  sand  under  the  action  of  the  weathering  influences, 
then  the  hills  are  generally  less  high  and  rugged  and  the  sides  of  the 
hills  less  steep. 

It  was  stated  before  that  the  rock  layers  making  up  the  hills  are 
mostly  sandstone,  shale,  and  clay,  and  that  shale  breaks  up  into  clay  in 
the  process  of  forming  soil.  A  mixture  of  sand  and  clay  has  been  called 
loam.  This  forms  the  basis  for  the  best  soils.  The  quality  of  the  soil 
therefore  depends  in  large  measure  upon  the  kinds  and  amounts  of  rock 
that  have  entered  into  the  formation  of  the  soil. 

There  are  places  where  the  proportion  of  clay  is  too  lax'ge  and  that 
of  sand  is  too  little,  with  the  result  that  the  soil  is  a  heavy  clay  soil. 
This  may  be  a  clay  loam  or  a  clay.  Many  so-called  "gumbo"  spots  are 

19 


286  THE    STORY    OF    THE    PRAIRIES. 

places  where  there  is  not  enough  sand  to  "lighten"  the  soil.  This  is 
not  the  only  cause  of  the  "gumbo"  spots,  but  it  is  one  of  them. 

Shales  generally  contain  soluble  mineral  substances  known  as  salts. 
These  are  popularly  known  as  "alkali."  Some  of  these  salts  are  really 
alkaline  in  their  nature,  but  not  all  of  them.  They  are  all  of  value, 
however,  in  the  soil  if  they  are  not  present  in  too  large  quantities.  It 
has  been  stated  before  that  alkali  is  a  valuable  ingredient  of  soil. 
"Gumbo"  lands  are  generally  lands  that  are  not  naturally  well  drained, 
so  that  the  alkalies  and  other  salts  accumulate  owing  to  the  fact  that 
too  little  water  runs  away  from  the  land  to  carry  away  the  salts. 

Clayey  soils  that  contain  considerable  alkali  are  generally  slippery 
and  sticky  when  wet,  and  the  land  bakes  into  hard  blocks  when  the  sun 
shines  upon  it  in  summer  after  it  has  been  much  wet  earlier  in  the 
spring.  Often  "gumbo"  lands  can  be  recognized  on  slopes  by  the  fre- 
quent occurrence  of  peculiar  little  spots  that  look  as  though  the  soil  had 
been  dug  up  or  pawed  by  animals.  These  spots  are  sometimes  thought 
to  have  been  formed  by  the  pawing  of  buffaloes  in  the  days  when  these 
animals  roamed  in  herds  over  the  prairies.  These  spots  are  really  little 
landslides  where  the  soil  has  slipped  when  wet  because  of  the  slippery 
greasy-like  character  of  the  soils  when  saturated  with  water.  "Gumbo" 
lands  generally  in  this  region  owe  their  peculiar  quality  to  the  presence 
of  alkali  in  the  soil. 

The  most  widely  distributed  soil  on  the  rolling  lands  west  of  the 
Missouri  River  is  loam. 

In  many  cases  where  the  soils  have  been  studied  clay  subsoil  has 
been  found.  This  affords  the  best  condition  for  general  farming.  A 
loam  soil  with  gravelly  or  sandy  subsoil  is  likely  to  suffer  from  drought 
where  the  same  soil  underlain  with  a  clay  subsoil  with  the  same  rainfall 
would  be  profitable  farming  land. 

There  are  four  phases  of  landscape  west  of  the  Missouri  River  with 
corresponding  soil  features.  These  four  kinds  of  landscape  are :  first, 
the  rolling  lands,  which  are  naturally  good  grass  lands,  the  soil  of 
which  is  loam;  second,  the  low  lands  in  the  hollows  among  the  rolling 
hills,  usually  in  their  native  condition  good  grass  lands,  the  soil  being 
often  more  clayey;  third,  the  stone  lands  of  the  high  hills  and  ridges; 
and  fourth,  the  lands  in  the  larger  stream  valleys,  in  which  the  soils 
range  from  clayey  to  fine  sandy,  coarse  sandy,  and  gravelly,  the  soils 
representing  flood  deposits  of  streams. 


A    STUDY    OF    THE    SOILS. 


287 


Classification  of  Soils. — The  classification  of  soils  is  ?  based  pri- 
marily upon  the  physical  properties,  but  all  factors  that  influence  the 
relation  of  soils  to  crops  are  taken  into  consideration,  so  far  as  they 
can  be  determined.  Three  factors  that  are  of  great  importance  in  soil 
classification  are  texture,  the  structure,  and  the  organic  matter  con- 
tained in  the  soil.  By  texture  is  meant  the  coarseness  or  fineness  of  the 
particles  of  rock  making  up  the  soil.  By  structure  is  meant  the  arrange- 
ment of  the  materials.  The  organic  matter  is  that  which  comes  from 
decaying  vegetable  or  animal  matter.  Then  the  factors  of  origin,  depth, 


FIG.  155.     One  of  the  First  Occupants  of  the  Soil. 

color,  natural  fertility,  and  the  topography  and  natural  drainage  of  the 
land,  all  enter  into  the  determination  of  the  character  of  the  soil. 

The  Soil  Classes. — Soils  are  divided  into  classes  on  the  basis  of 
their  texture,  that  is  of  the  relative  amounts  of  finer  and  coarser  parti- 
cles of  rock  of  which  they  are  composed.  Thus  there  may  be  clay,  clay 
loam,  loam,  sandy  loam,  sand,  gravelly  loam,  and  gravel,  according  to 
the  amounts  of  materials  of  different  grades  of  fineness.  The  difference 
between  a  clay  soil  and  a  sandy  soil  is  one  of  the  size  of  the  particles 
only,  and  the  specific  determination  of  the  type  will  depend  upon  the 
relative  amounts  of  the  materials  of  different  degrees  of  fineness.  Wheat- 


288  THE    STORY    OF    THE    PRAIRIES. 

land  sand,  for  instance,  contains  a  large  percentage  of  small  bits  of  rock 
of  the  size  of  sand  grains.  Marshall  clay  contains  a  large  percentage 
of  clay  with  very  little  of  sand  or  gravel. 

In  addition  to  the  fine  particles  of  earth  of  which  soils  are  com- 
posed there  may  be  also  large  particles,  such  as  smaller  or  larger  peb- 
bles and  stone  fragments.  If  these  fragments  are  small  in  size  yet  larger 
than  sand  grains  they  are  called  "gravel;"  if  they  are  too  larjge  to  be 
called  gravel  then  they  are  known  as  "stones."  Thus  there  may  be 
stony  loam,  gravelly  loam,  sandy  loam,  stony  clay,  gravelly  clay,  sandy 
clay,  etc. 

A  further  study  of  the  different  classes  of  soils  will  be  made  later 
in  connection  with  the  consideration  of  the  various  kinds  of  soil  in 
North  Dakota. 

The  Soil  Series — Soils  are  arranged  in  series  according  to  the 
manner  in  which  they  have  been  formed,  and  by  conditions  of  topo- 
graphy, drainage,  etc.  The  soils  in  any  region  may  include  all  the 
classes,  but  may  belong  to  one  series,  because  all  were  formed  by  the 
same  general  process.  For  example,  all  the  soils  may  be  of  glacial 
origin,  or  all  might  have  been  formed  from  sediments  deposited  in  a 
large  body  of  water.  In  another  locality  there  may  be  the  same  classes 
but  belonging  to  different  series,  because  they  have  been  formed  by  dif- 
ferent processes.  For  example,  in  the  western  part  of  North  Dakota 
there  may  be  seen  the  residual  soil,  or  those  formed  from  the  rocks 
of  the  region  where  the  soils  occur ;  there  are  glacial  soils,  or  those  that 
have  been  ground  and  transported  by  the  great  ice  sheet;  and  there 
may  also  be  the  soils  that  result  from  the  floods  of  the  Missouri  River, 
or  stream  deposited  soils;  and  each  of  these  series  may  be  represented 
by  any  or  all  the  different  classes  of  soils  that  have  been  referred  to. 

Upon  the  rolling  prairies  of  North  Dakota  there  occur  Marshall 
stony  loam,  Marshall  gravelly  loam,  Marshall  fine  sandy  loam,  Marshall 
loam,  Marshall  silt  loam,  Marshall  clay  loam,  and  Marshall  clay.  These 
different  soil  types  have  all  had  the  same  general  history  as  to  the  pro- 
cesses of  their  formation,  and  they  are  therefore  all  classified  in  one 
series.  Another  series  known  as  the  Clyde  series  differs  from  the 
Marshall  series  in  that,  while  the  soils  are  of  glacial  or  drift  origin, 
they  have  had  a  different  history,  or  have  been  formed  by  different 
processes  from  the  Marshall  series,  and  this  makes  often  a  very  marked 
difference  in  the  quality  of  the  soil.  There  may  be  the  same  classes  of 


A    STUDY    OF    THE    SOILS.  289 

the  Clyde  series,  as  Clyde  stony  loam,  Clyde  gravelly  loam,  etc.  So 
also  the  Sioux  series  is  another  series  that  occurs  in  North  Dakota, 
and  this  too  has  been  through  a  different  set  of  conditions  from  any 
of  the  others.  The  gravelly  and  sandy  loams  and  clays  of  the  Sioux 
series  have  been  formed  by  the  action  of  glacial  waters  in  streams. 
Thus  while  there  may  be  a  sandy  loam  in  any  one  of  several  different 
series,  and  the  texture  of  the  soil  might  be  about  the  same  in  all,  yet  the 
structure  and  the  resulting  quality  of  the  soil  will  be  different. 

The  Soil  Map  of  the  State — Several  soil  surveys  have  been  made 
in  the  state,  and  these  have  been  upon  quite  widely  separated  areas  so 
as  to  make  as  representative  a  study  of  the  soils  of  the  state  as  possible 
in  the  shortest  time.  By  taking  the  soil  maps  of  these  areas  it  is  possi- 
ble to  construct  a  map  of  the  whole  state  with  a  fair  degree  of  accuracy. 

Two  areas  have  been  surveyed  in  the  Red  River  Valley,  one  embrac- 
ing a  portion  of  Grand  Forks  County,  and  the  other  a  portion  of  Cass 
County.  These  two  surveys  give  a  fairly  representative  study  of  the 
soils  of  the  Red  River  Valley.  The  Ransom  County  area,  consisting 
of  twenty-four  townships,  embraces  a  portion  of  the  Sheyenne  delta 
and  the  lower  Sheyenne  Valley,  and  the  rolling  prairie  adjoining  the 
Red  River  Valley  on  the  west.  The  Jamestown  area  extends  from  the 
Sheyenne  Valley  at  Valley  City  westward  ten  miles  beyond  James- 
town, and  includes  the  eastern  edge  of  the  Missouri  Plateau.  The 
Carrington-Cooperstown  area  includes  two  tiers  of  townships  extending 
across  Griggs  and  Foster  Counties.  This  area  extends  from  the  Shey- 
enne Valley  east  of  Cooperstown  westward  across  the  fine  farming 
lands  of  these  counties,  crossing  the  James  Valley  and  extending  to  the 
edge  of  the  Missouri  Plateau.  The  Cando  area  includes  eight  town- 
ships in  southern  Towner  County.  The  Ransom  County  area,  the 
Jamestown  area,  the  Carrington-Cooperstown  area,  and  the  Cando'  area 
thus  represent  the  soil  types  of  the  great  east  central  portion  of  the 
state. 

The  Minot  area  is  so  located  as  to  include  the  soils  of  the  famous 
Mouse  River  Valley  and  the  lands  to  the  westward  which  were  once 
the  shore  of  Glacial  Lake  Souris.  A  preliminary  survey  of  seventeen 
townships  in  Ward  and  McLean  Counties,  embracing  a  portion  of  the 
hill  country  south  and  west  of  Minot  commonly  known  as  the  coteaus, 
or  the  Coteau  du  Missouri,  and  including  also  a  portion  of  the  Missouri 


290  THE    STORY    OF    THE    PRAIRIES. 

slope  to  the  westward,   represents  a  large  region   in  the  west  central 
portion  of  the  state. 

The  Williston  area,  including  seventeen  townships  in  southern  Will- 
iams County,  represents  the  upland  glacial  soils  of  the  older  or  Kansan 
drift,  and  also  includes  most  of  the  irrigable  land  in  the  Williston  irri- 
gation project.  A  survey  in  the  Cannon  Ball  district  in  Morton,  Het- 
tinger  and  Adams  Counties  furnishes  data  on  the  soils  of  the  great 
empire  west  of  the  Missouri  River  and  south  of  the  main  line  of  the 
Northern  Pacific  railway.  This  area  is  so  located  that  the  soil  types 
include  all  those  likely  to  occur  between  the  Missouri  River  on  the  east 
and  the  Little  Missouri  on  the  west. 

It  will  be  recalled  that  the  older  or  Kansan  drift  extends  for  some 
distance  west  of  the  Missouri  River,  the  drift  deposits  being  represented 
by  scattering  granite  boulders  and  thin  deposits  of  sand  and  gravel. 
The  boulders  become  less  numerous  and  the  sand  and  gravel  thinner 
westward  till  they  disappear  entirely  in  western  Morton  County.  The 
soils  are  thus  largely  residual,  having  been  derived  from  the  weather- 
ing and  erosion  of  the  rocks  of  that  region. 

The  McKenzie  County  area  is  situated  west  of  the  Little  Missouri 
River  and  about  midway  between  the  main  lines  of  the  Great  Northern 
and  Northern  Pacific  railways,  and  abuts  the  western  boundary  of  the 
state.  This  area  lies  beyond  the  limits  of  the  territory  supposed  to 
have  been  crossed  by  the  Great  Ice  Sheet.  The  soils  are  therefore  the 
residual  soils  formed  from  the  weathering  and  erosion  of  the  native 
rocks. 

Thus  an  aggregate  area  embracing  about  one  hundred  fifty  town- 
ships has  been  examined  in  detail,  and  accurately  mapped.  This  is 
5,400  square  miles,  or  approximately  three  and  one-half  million  acres. 
From  the  data  thus  furnished  it  is  possible  to  compile  a  soil  map  repre- 
senting the  whole  state.  Such  a  map  is  designed  to  accompany  this 
chapter.  It  is  in  preparation  and  will  soon  be  published.  Those  who 
are  interested  in  any  particular  section  of  the  state  will  be  able  to  make 
a  very  satisfactory  study  of  the  soils  of  any  region  by  use  of  this  map 
and  the  more  detailed  maps  which  represent  the  particular  area  described. 
Copies  of  these  detailed  soil  maps  and  the  accompanying  reports 
describing  the  soils  can  be  obtained,  unless  out  of  print,  by  applying  to 
the  director  of  the  Agricultural  College  Survey,  Fargo,  N.  D. 


CHAPTER  THE  TWENTY-SIXTH. 
MINERALS  IN   NORTH   DAKOTA. 

The  search  for  valuable  minerals  in  the  earth  is  as  old  as  civiliza- 
tion itself,  and  is  as  young  as  the  progressive,  alert,  and  active  age  in 
which  we  live.  Men  have  always  searched  for  valuable  or  curious 
minerals  in  the  earth  and  they  probably  always  will.  There  is  probably 
no  land  or  people  that  has  been  free  from  the  search  and  the  searchers 
after  valuable  or  curious  minerals.  There  is  no  state  in  the  union  in 
which  valuable,  rare,  or  curious  minerals  have  not  been  looked  for,  and 
in  a  very  large  number  of  states  they  have  been  found.  In  fact  there 
are  few  if  any  states  in  which  there  is  not  some  mineral  of  some  kind 
found  that  is  of  value. 

As  long  as  human  nature  is  the  same  as  it  ever  has  been  the  search 
for  hidden  wealth  will  probably  go  on.  North  Dakota  in  common  with 
other  states  and  countries  will  have  people  who  will  search  (in  vain  or 
otherwise)  for  hidden  treasure.  And  the  writer  will  not  attempt  to  say 
that  these  searchers  for  hidden  wealth  are  doomed  to  certain  disap- 
pointment. He  does  not  care  to  make  any  such  statement  as  that  there 
never  can  and  never  will  be  any  valuable  metal  found  deep  in  the  earth 
in  North  Dakota,  or  that  some  valuable  mineral  that  as  yet  has '  never 
been  thought  of  may  be  buried  beneath  North  Dakota  soil.  Things 
just  as  strange  have  happened.  Geologists  like  other  people  make  mis- 
takes. There  is  no  evidence  known  at  the  present  time  that  points  to 
the  probability  that  any  great  discovery  of  precious  metals,  rare  gems, 
or  valuable  minerals  other  than  those  that  are  now  known  to  occur 
(coal,  underground  water,  clays,  and  building  stone)  will  ever  be  found. 
But  too  little  is  known  about  this  great  earth  of  ours  to  make  sweeping 
statements  safe  about  what  never  can  and  never  will  be  found.  What 
rich  deposits  of  gold,  silver,  copper,  or  iron;  or  valuable  beds  of  rock 
salt,  gypsum,  or  asphalt;  or  caverns  of  petroleum,  or  natural  gas,  may 
lie  hidden  from  view  beneath  thousands  of  feet  of  rock  it  may  be  safely 
said  we  do  not  know.  We  may  as  well  say  frankly  that  we  do  not  know, 
for  we  do  not.  It  may  be  said  that  the  odds  are  tremendously  against 

291 


292  THE    STORY    OF   THE    PRAIRIES. 

the  probability  of  any  of  these  substances  occurring  in  large  amounts, 
but  as  a  matter  of  known  fact  we  know  the  rocks  that  lie  beneath  the 
surface  in  North  Dakota  only  very  superficially,  and  our  inferred  knowl- 
edge of  them,  gathered  from  regions  surrounding,  while  this  seems  to 
give  us  good  assurance  for  believing  that  there  are  no  valuable  min- 
erals hidden  deep  below  our  lands,  yet  this  does  not  enable  us  to  say 
we  know. 

North  Dakota  is  pre-eminently  an  agricultural  state,  that  is,  her 
chief  sources  of  wealth  lie  in  agricultural  lines  rather  than  in  mineral 
resources.  Nevertheless  North  Dakota  is  not  without  valuable  re- 
sources of  a  mineral  character.  And  in  a  state  where  there  seems  to  be 
little  to  interest  the  mining  prospector,  there  may  yet  be  discoveries 
made  that  will  prove  to  be  of  great  importance  and  value.  No  one 
knew  a  few  years  ago  what  valuable  clays  lay  hidden  below  the  surface. 
Even  yet  we  do  not  know  what  resources  there  are  in  our  clays,  because 
they  have  not  been  fully  tested.  So  lignite  coal  is  a  mineral  the  full 
value  of  which  has  not  been  fully  determined.  Underground  water 
and  building  stone  are  mineral  substances  of  great  importance,  and 
belong  in  the  catalogue  of  North  Dakota's  mineral  resources.  While 
we  are  seeking  to  develop  the  resources  of  the  clays,  coal,  building  stone, 
and  underground  water  we  may  come  upon  something  of  great  value, 
the  presence  of  which  has  never  before  been  suspected. 

The  purpose  of  this  chapter,  however,  is  not  to  dwell  upon  the  possi- 
bilities of  future  development  of  mineral  wealth  in  North  Dakota,  nor 
to  explain  how  the  mineral  resources  that  we  know  we  possess  may  be 
best  utilized.  The  object  is  rather  to  explain  the  nature  and  describe 
the  appearance  of  some  of  the  common  minerals  that  are  often  mis- 
taken for  something  valuable,  some  of  which  would  have  commercial 
value  if  they  occurred  in  large  quantities,  and  upon  which  many  times 
considerable  money  and  time  are  spent  in  the  mistaken  notion  that  the 
mineral  contains  some  precious  metal  or  valuable  gem. 

There  are  many  mineral  substances  found  in  North  Dakota  which 
in  appearance  seem  to  resemble  gold  or  other  valuable  metal,  or  which 
seem  to  resemble  gems.  Many  specimens  of  such  minerals  are  sent  to 
the  writer  every  year  with  the  inquiry  whether  the  sample  contains 
anything  valuable,  or  has  value  as  a  gem.  A  fe\v  of  these  minerals 
will  be  described  and  something  of  their  mode  of  occurrence  in  the 
earth  given.  A  little  knowledge  of  the  geology  of  the  mineral,  in 


MINERALS    IN    NORTH    DAKOTA.  293 

connection  with  a  description  of  its  appearance,  will  often  enable  one 
to  determine  both  the  name  of  the  mineral  and  whether  it  has  any 
value. 

Among  the  minerals  that  occur  in  North  Dakota  that  are  most  com- 
monly mistaken  for  the  ores  of  the  precious  metals  are  pyrite  (iron 
pyrites),  gypsum,  mica  and  other  minerals  occurring  in  granite  rock, 
and  lime  crystals.  These  minerals  occur  in  such  varieties  of  form,  and 
often  have  such  bright,  metallic,  or  shiny  appearance  that  they  are  often 
mistaken  for  precious  metals  or  gems  by  those  who  are  not  informed 
as  to  the  forms  in  which  very  common  minerals  occur. 

Iron  Minerals. — Let  us  note  some  of  the  common  minerals  of  iron. 
It  should  be  understood  that  this  is  not  an  attempt  to  describe  all  the 
ores  of  iron,  nor  yet  to  describe  all  the  forms  in  which  iron  minerals 
or  ores  occur  in  North  Dakota,  but  rather  to  describe  those  that  are 
most  commonly  found,  and  which  are  most  likely  to  be  mistaken  for 
something  else,  or  mistakenly  supposed  to  be  some  form  of  precious 
metal. 

Pyrite,  or  Iron  Pyrites — Pyrite  or  iron  pyrites,  known  to  the 
chemist  as  sulphide  of  iron,  or  more  strictly,  disulphide  of  iron,  is  now 
and  ever  has  been  one  of  the  greatest  deceivers  of  the  searchers  after 
precious  metals  that  the  world  has  ever  known.  It  has  come  to  be 
known  as  "fool's  gold"  from  the  fact  that  it  has  been  so  many  times 
mistaken  for  gold.  Every  year  many  specimens  of  this  mineral  are 
taken  to  chemist  or  assayer  or  geologist  in  the  eager  expectation  that 
he  will  pronounce  it  the  king  of  metals.  Instead  of  this,  however,  it 
is  one  of  the  most  worthless  of  substances  in  the  manner  in  which  it 
often  occurs,  and  more  than  this  it  .is  frequently  a  great  nuisance  inter- 
fering with  the  utilization  of  some  other  material.  It  occurs  often  in 
beautiful  crystals  that  have  a  yellow  color,  and  yellow  suggests  gold. 
It  occurs  also  in  massive  form,  and  has  many  times  a  beautiful  yellow 
color.  It  may  be  found  in  hard  quartz  rock;  and  gold  occurs  in  hard 
quartz  rock.  Or  it  may  be  found  in  beautiful  shiny  yellow  bits  in  sand 
or  gravel  beds.  Placer  gold  occurs  in  such  beds  of  sand  and  gravel. 
The  conclusion  is  thus  readily  reached  that  this  is  probably  gold. 

Pyrite  occurs  also  too  commonly  and  abundantly  in  connection  with 
lignite  coal.  This  is  the  substance  that  gives  the  sickening  sulphurous 
odor  to  burning  lignite.  Many  times  it  occurs  in  cracks  or  crevasses 


294  THE    STORY    OF    THE    PRAIRIES. 

in  coal  seams  in  beautiful  yellow  crystals.  It  is  a  nuisance  worse 
than  worthless  when  it  occurs  in  this  manner. 

This  same  mineral  is  encountered  in  drilling  artesian  wells,  and  is 
often  referred  to  by  the  driller  as  "iron  ore."  In  this  case  it  is  not 
generally  crystalline,  and  is  very  hard.  Some  times  well  or  spring 
waters  have  a.  distinctly  sulphurous  smell  and  taste  derived  from  the 
water  passing  through  rock  in  which  pyrite  is  present. 

This  mineral  is  also  found  in  the  form  of  nodules,  the  mineral  hav- 
ing collected  around  some  particle  of  shell,  stone,  or  other  substance 
which  acted  as  a  nucleus.  When  these  nodules  are  freshly  broken  the 
mineral  appears  a  bright  and  shiny  yellow,  and  readily  excites  the 
imagination  of  the  searcher  for  rare  gems  or  precious  metals  who  may 
not  have  learned  the  lesson  of  "fool's  gold."  Of  this  mineral  it  may 
with  much  truth  be  said  "all  that  glitters  is  not  gold." 

There  is,  however,  a  redeeming  feature  about  pyrite,  or  fool's  gold. 
It  is  commercially  valuable  as  a  source  of  certain  chemical  substances. 
Sulphur  may  be  obtained  from  it  by  roasting  the .  mineral  in  a  retort, 
the  sulphur  easily  vaporizing  and  passing  off  into  a  collecting  receptacle. 
The  black  slag  that  remains  is  an  oxide  of  iron.  It  is  not  a  common 
source  for  obtaining  metallic  iron  owing  to  the  difficulty  of  separating 
all  the  sulphur.  It  is,  however,  one  of  the  sources  from  which  the 
world's  supply  of  sulphur  is  obtained.  Pyrite  or  iron  sulphide  also  has 
high  importance  in  the  arts  as  a  source  from  which  green  vitriol,  or 
copperas,  iron  sulphate,  is  obtained,  and  also  in  the  manufacture  of  oil 
of  vitriol,  or  sulphuric  acid.  These  substances  are  of  considerable  com- 
mercial importance  owing  to  their  wide  use  in  the  arts,  and  fool's  gold 
therefore  has  its  value. 

Iron  sulphate,  or  green  vitriol,  differs  from  iron  sulphide,  or  pyrite, 
in  that  the  latter  has  been  oxidized  to  produce  the  former.  Oxidizing 
is  the  chemist's  term  for  burning.  Sometimes  this  oxidized  form,  the 
sulphate,  is  seen  in  crevasses  in  outcropping  seams  of  lignite  coal  where 
the  pyrite  has  been  exposed  to  the  air  and  moisture.  Under  these  condi- 
tions the  sulphide  oxidizes  or  burns  to  the  sulphate.  This  may  often 
be  recognized  on  the  walls  of  old  or  damp  mines,  and  frequently  in  bins 
of  lignite  where  it  is  stored  in  damp  places.  The  sulphate  appears  as  a 
nearly  white  powder,  but  if  dissolved  in  water  it  is  green.  If  the  min- 
eral is  allowed  to  crystallize  out  of  the  water  the  crystals  will  be  green. 
This  is  the  reason  it  is  called  green  vitriol — it  looks  like  green  glass. 


MINERALS    IN    NORTH   DAKOTA. 


295 


The  question  is  often  asked  by  those  who  send  specimens  to  be 
analyzed  whether  this  material,  pyrite,  has  any  value.  It  may  be 
answered  that  it  does,  if  it  occurs  in  sufficient  quantity  and  where  it  can 
be  handled.  The  process  of  manufacture  is  simple.  The  sulphur  can 
be  mostly  driven  off  by  very  moderate  heat,  and  saved  without  much 
trouble.  The  black  residue  has  simply  to  be  thrown  into  a  broad  flat 
heap  and  allowed  to  lie  exposed  to  the  weather.  The  valuable  iron  sul- 
phate which  will  slowly  form  will  now  leach  out  from  the  heap  and  may 
be  obtained  by  collecting  as  it  escapes. 


FIG.  156.    Sandstone  Concretions,  near  Schafer,  McKenzie  County. 
Photograph  by  A.  L.  Felloivs. 

It  should  be  stated  that  true  iron  ore  occurs  in  the  western  part  of 
North  Dakota  in  seams  or  beds  in  the  sandstone.  Sometimes  it  is  in 
very  hard  layers  which  project  out  of  the  sides  of  the  buttes.  This 
ore  should  not  be  confused  with  pyrite.  It  might  be  commercially  val- 
uable as  a  source  of  metallic  iron,  hence  regarded  as  a  true  ore,  if  it  were 
more  accessible.  It  does  not  appear  as  though  it  would  ever  be  of  much 


296  THE    STORY    OF    THE    PRAIRIES. 

commercial  importance,  as  it  occurs,  so  far  as  yet  observed,  in  thin 
seams,  and  in  regions  quite  inaccessible  to  railroads  or  means  of  man- 
ufacture. 

Samples  of  iron-bearing  sand  have  also  been  taken  in  different  places 
in  North  Dakota,  and  excitement  has  sometimes  been  aroused  that  these 
sands  might  represent  some  valuable  deposit.  But  in  all  cases  observed 
these  samples  have  been  from  drift  sands,  and  therefore  are  to  be  ex- 
plained as  glacial  in  their  mode  of  occurrence,  and  hence  local  and 
limited  in  amount.  True  magnetic  ore  has  been  observed  in  such  sands, 
indicating  that  fragments  of  magnetite  or  other  hard  ore  has  been  broken 
up  by  the  ice  and  transported  from  some  iron-bearing  region  to  the 
north. 

Gold  and  Things  Not  Gold — In  "prospecting"  for  gold  there  are 
two  considerations  of  importance,  viz.,  the  occurrence  of  gold  (as  dis- 
tinguished from  minerals  that  may  be  mistaken  for  gold),  and  its 
occurrence  in  paying  quantities.  These  are  matters  to  be  reckoned 
with  anywhere,  and  they  therefore  apply  in  North  Dakota. 

As  has  already  been  observed  pyrite  is  sometimes  mistaken  for 
gold,  and  there  are  other  minerals  also  that  not  infrequently  deceive  the 
inexperienced  prospector.  But  gold  has  been  found  in  North  Dakota, 
and  it  is  reasonably  safe  to  say  that  more  will  probably  be  found.  This 
is  not  prophesying  that  any  profitable  mines  will  ever  be  developed, 
'however. 

Gold — Gold  occurs  in  some  sands  in  North  Dakota,  as  has  been 
shown  by  scientific  assays.  The  writer  does  not  know  of  any  instance 
where  anything  like  a  paying  quantity  was  found,  but  still  enough  has 
been  found  to  say  "gold."  The  sands  referred  to  were  drift  sands,  and 
the  gold  was  "free"  gold,  that  is,  it  was  in  the  form  of  small  bits  of 
yellow  metal.  Its  occurrence  in  drift  sands  or  gravels  means,  as  in 
the  case  of  the  magnetic  iron  sands  referred  to,  that  the  gold  has  been 
transported  by  the  great  ice  sheet,  and  deposited  with  the  other  earth 
materials  borne  by  the  ice.  Gold  is  heavy,  and  so  when  borne  by  the 
ice  waters  that  escaped  from  the  melting  glacier  it  would  naturally  sink 
sooner  than  the  lighter  earth  and  stones.  Whatever  gold  there  may  be 
therefore  is  not  evenly  distributed  through  all  the  gravels  and  sands  of 
a  stream  bed  where  it  may  be  found  to  occur.  It  would  be  collected 
somewhat  into  pockets  and  basins  because  of  its  weight,  and  if  one  of 


MINERALS   IN   NORTH   DAKOTA.  297 

these  pockets  happens  to  be  discovered  there  may  be,  and  sometimes  is, 
enough  gold  found  to  create  an  excitement. 

Gold  in  Hard  Boulders — Gold  is  sometimes  observed  in  a  hard 
boulder  rock  on  the  prairie.  If  there  is  some  gold  there  must  be  more, 
some  one  may  reason,  and  so  begin  to  dig  and  search  for  more.  The 
most  elementary  knowledge  of  glacial  geology  should  enable  one  to 
distinguish  a  "hardhead"  or  drift  boulder,  and  once  this  is  recognized 
it  will  be  seen  that  the  extent  of  this  particular  mine  will  be  determined 
by  the  size  of  the  boulder.  This  rock,  like  the  gold-bearing  sand,  has 
been  transported  by  the  ice  from  some  rock  ledge  far  to  the  north  in 
which  gold  occurs.  There  might  not  be  another  like  this  within 
many  miles.  However,  the  discovery  of  a  small  bit  of  gold  in  a  boulder 
has  more  than  once  been  the  cause  of  a  "gold  excitement,"  and  has 
been  the  innocent  occasion  of  many  claims  being  "staked  out"  all  about 
the  place  where  the  great  continental  glacier  permitted  the  boulder  to 
come  to  rest. 

Gold  in  Shale — Several  "gold  scares"  have  occurred  in  North  Da- 
,  kota,  and  no  doubt  in  other  states,  by  discoveries  of  gold  in  pockets  or 
'  cavities  in  shale  rock.     The  explanation  of  the  occurrence  of  gold,  if 
gold  there  be,  must  be  looked  for  in  the  surroundings  where  the  "find" 
is  made,  and  from  a  study  made  upon  the  ground.     However  some  sug- 
gestions as  to  the  manner  in  which  gold  might  occur  under  such  condi- 
tions may  be  made. 

There  is  a  very  small  trace  of  gold  distributed  very  widely  through 
nature.  It  is  said  by  good  authorities  that  all  sea  waters  contain  a 
trace  of  gold.  If  this  has  been  the  case  through  past  geologic  ages 
then  there  might  have  been  a  slight  trace  of  gold  in  the  sediments 
deposited  upon  the  bottoms  of  the  sea.  The  shales  and  sandstones  of 
North  Dakota  are  sea  sediments.  If  there  was  therefore  ever  so  slight 
an  amount  of  gold  deposited  with  the  muds  and  sands  on  the  bottoms 
of  these  seas  then  there  must  be  a  little  gold  in  the  rocks  of  North 
Dakota  which  lie  underneath  the  drift.  Wherever  favorable  pockets 
for  the  concentration  of  the  heavy  gold  might  happen  to  be  there  might 
be  enough  gold  so  that  it  could  be  recognized.  This  again  might  be 
enough  to  cause  a  "discovery"  to  be  made.  Several  such  "finds"  have 
been  made  in  North  Dakota,  and  in  some  cases  considerable  time  and 
labor  have  been  spent  in  attempting  to  develop  mining  properties. 


298  THE  STORY    OF   THE    PRAIRIES. 

Mica  Mistaken  for  Gold. — One  of  the  most  common  mistakes  made 
by  those  who  see  gold  in  every  thing  that  is  yellow  is  that  of 
assuming  small  bits  of  bright  yellow  material  to  be  gold  just  because 
it  is  yellow,  and,  as  they  think,  looks  like  it.  Again,  the  least  knowledge 
of  field  geology  or  practical  prospecting  would  show  that  bits  of  yellow 
mica  have  none  of  the  properties  that  distinguish  gold.  In  the  first 
place  gold  is  heavy,  and  the  thin  scales  of  mica  are  light,  so  much  so 
that  so  simple  a  test  as  that  of  blowing  with  the  breath  would  show 
them  to  be  too  light  for  gold.  A  further  test  by  washing  or  "panning" 
would  add  proof  to  probability  that  the  material  is  not  gold.  Gold  is 
the  last  thing  to  be  washed  out  of  the  pan  in  the  panning  process  sim- 
ply because  it  is  heavy.  By  washing  any  suspected  sand  in  a  common 
basin  or  dish  it  will  be  shown  pretty  conclusively  whether  there  are  any 
heavy  grains  of  yellow  'metal.  Then  if  there  is  still  any  doubt  or  ques- 
tion it  may  be  further  tested  with  a  few  drops  of  mercury.  If  the  sus- 
pected yellow  particles  are  really  gold  they  will  quickly  disappear  when 
touched  by  the  mercury.  Gold  forms  an  amalgam  with  mercury,  which 
is  about  the  same  thing  as  saying  that  gold  dissolves  in  mercury.  If 
the  yellow  bits  are  not  affected  by  the  mercury  then  they  are  probably 
either  mica,  or  fool's  gold  or  pyrite. 

Copper  and  Lead — There  are  two  metals  besides  iron  and  gold 
that  have  been  found  in  North  Dakota,  and  therefore  that  may  be  found 
again.  If  they  are  ever  discovered  in  paying  quantities  it  will  be  neces- 
sary to  revise  our  supposed  knowledge  of  the  geology  of  the  state  .some- 
what, as  this  would  be  in  the  nature  of  an  addition  to  present  knowledge 
of  the  geology  of  the  state.  These  metals  are  copper  and  lead,  the  former 
has  been  found  in  the  form  of  small  nuggets  of  the  native  metal  in  drift 
deposits.  It  is  not  known  to  occur  in  the  stratified  rocks  of  the  state. 
Its  explanation  is  therefore  to  be  found  in  the  same  conditions  that  make 
it  possible  for  iron  or  gold  to  be  found  in  drift  deposits.  Lead  has 
been  found  in  the  rocks  of  North  Dakota  in  the  region  west  of  the 
Missouri  River  where  the  ice  of  the  great  glacier  did  not  extend.  Its 
occurrence  is  therefore  a  suggestion  that  more  might  be  found.  As  has 
been  stated  before,  it  is  not  wise  or  safe  to  make  sweeping  statements 
about  what  never  can  and  never  will  be  found.  Lead  may  prove  to  have 
been  in  the  ancient  sea  waters,  and  so  may  occur  in  appreciable  quan- 
tities in  the  rocks  of  North  Dakota.  A  few  years  ago  the  presence  of 
lead  in  the  limestone  rocks  of  Wisconsin  was  unsuspected.  In  fact  it 


MINERALS  IN  NORTH  DAKOTA. 


299 


had  been  supposed  by  those  who  were  thought  to  know  that  no  mineral 
of  value  would  ever  be  discovered  in  the  rocks  of  these  prairies,  since 
no  volcanic  outburst  or  mountain  upheaval  had  ever  occurred  in  the 
region,  and  it  was  thought  that  there  was  no  possibility  of  any  valuable 
ore  being  there.  Nevertheless  very  valuable  lead  and  zinc  mines  have 
been  developed  in  the  rocks  underlying  those  prairies. 

Non-Metallic  Minerals — It  seems  fairly  certain  from  the  geologic 
structure  of  North  Dakota  that  no  metallic  minerals  of  commercial  im- 
portance lie  hidden  in  the  rocks.  At  any  rate  none  have  been  discovered. 


FIG.  157.    Stone  School-House,  Made  of  (Petrified)  Wood,  New  England,  Hettinger  County. 
Photograph  by  A.  L.  Fellows. 

There  are  several  minerals  of  non-metallic  character,  however,  the  more 
important  of  which  have  already  been  mentioned.  There  are  a  number 
of  minerals  that  are  quite  widely  distributed  which  would  have  con- 
siderable commercial  importance  if  they  occurred  in  sufficient  quantity 
to  pay  to  mine  them.  Some  of  these  occur  in  the  form  of  crystals  and 
attract  attention  by  reason  of  their  appearance.  Some  of  the  common 
ones  will  be  described. 

Lime  Minerals. — Among  the  common  minerals  that  occur  in  crys- 
talline form  are  various  kinds  of  lime  or  calcium  minerals.    These  min- 


300  THE    STORY    OF   THE    PRAIRIES. 

erals  may  occur  also  in  the  massive  or  uncrystalline  form.  They  occur 
in  the  drift  deposits  and  also  in  the  stratified  rocks  that  underlie  the 
drift,  and  in  the  rocks  west  of  the  Missouri  River  where  no  drift  occurs. 
They  are  not  of  much  importance  owing  to  the  fact  that  they  do  not 
comprise  large  enough  deposits  to  make  them  available  for  any  practi- 
cal purpose.  They  are  described  here  because  they  are  so  common  and 
are  so  often  sent  to  our  laboratory  for  analysis.  They  attract  attention* 
by  their  bright  crystal  faces  and  transparent  character,  and  they  sug- 
gest the  quality  of  gems  to  those  who  are  not  familiar  with  the  nature 
of  such  minerals. 

Gypsum — Gypsum,  or  calcium  sulphate,  is  perhaps  one  of  the  most 
common  crystalline  minerals  in  our  native  rocks,  and  it  is  one  which 
attracts  attention  because  of  its  transparent  crystalline  character  and 
bright  shiny  surfaces.  It  occurs  in  such  abundance  in  the  rocks  west 
of  the  Missouri  River  that  the  sides  of  naked  buttes  frequently  present 
the  appearance  of  gem-studded  hills  from  the  reflection  of  the  sunlight 
from  the  glistening  surfaces  of  these  crystals.  The  shales  that  are 
exposed  in  the  P'embina  Mountain  escarpment  abound  in  these  crystals. 
They  are  likely  to  be  found  wherever  the  shale  rocks  are  exposed  at  the 
surface.  So  also  they  are  frequently  found  in  cavities  in  the  clay  of 
the  drift  where  the  clay  has  been  formed  from  the  grinding  up  of  the 
shale  by  the  passage  of  the  great  ice  sheet  over  the  landscape.  This 
explains  why  they  are  frequently  found  in  digging  wells.  Sometimes 
in  such  cases  they  are  found  in  roughly  roundish  aggregations  of  crys- 
tals. This  peculiar  form  has  caused  them  to  be  supposed  to  grow  in  the 
earth  after  the  manner  of  potatoes,  the  projecting  prong-like  crystals 
being  thought  to  represent  roots. 

In  answering  the  question  whether  this  mineral  has  any  value  it  may 
only  be  said  that  it  would  have  if  enough  could  be  obtained  at  one  place 
to  make  it  worth  while  to  handle  it.  The  mineral  occurs  very  widely 
distributed  in  the  rocks,  but  the  crystals,  which  represent  nearly  pure 
mineral,  are  generally  thinly  distributed.  They  form  in  crevasses  and 
cavities  in  the  rocks  from  ground  waters  that  percolate  through  the 
earth,  the  waters  first  dissolving  the  mineral  and  later,  when  condi- 
tions change,  depositing  it  as  crystal.  The  crystals  when  heated  give 
off  water  and  break  down  into  a  white  powder  which  is  known  as  Plaster 
of  P'aris,  which  substance  is  much  used  in  the  arts.  Gypsum  is  also 


MINERALS    IN    NORTH   DAKOTA. 


301 


used  as  a  fertilizer,  being  first  ground  to  a  fine  powder,  and  is  sold 
under  the  name  of  land  plaster. 

Calcium  Carbonate — Calcium  carbonate,  a  common  form  of  which 
is  limestone,  is  a  mineral  which  is  widely  distributed  in  the  drift  of 
North  Dakota,  and  while  it  is  not  one  of  the  native  rocks,  in  the  strict 
sense,  yet  it  has  been  transported  within  our  borders  in  such  quantity 
as  to  become  an  important  element  in  our  soils  and  underground  waters. 
Some  late  observations  indicate  that  there  are  limestone  strata  in  some 
of  the  higher  buttes  or  monadnocks  west  of  the  Missouri  River,  but 
they  do  not  occur  over  a  large  area. 

Limestone  boulders  are  so  common  in  some  sections  of  the  state 
that  they  have  been  collected  and  burned  in  kilns  for  the  lime  they  con- 
tain. The  Lime  Kiln  buttes,  southeast  of  Dickinson,  are  said  to  have 
gained  their  name  from  the  burning  of  limestone  rock  from  strata  in 
those  buttes.  It  is,  however,  as  rock  either  for  burning  for  lime  or  for 
building  stone  that  limestone  has  played  the  most  important  role  in 
North  Dakota.  It  is  widely  distributed  through  our  soils,  and  so>  great 
is  the  amount  that  has  been  mixed  with  the  drift  that  our  well  waters 
and  the  waters  of  most  of  our  lakes  and  streams  are  hard  from  the 
presence  of  this  mineral.  Its  wide  distribution  in  the  soil  adds  a  valu- 
able ingredient  to  the  soil  also,  as  this  mineral  is  important  in  the 


20 


FIG.  1573.    An  Agatized  Stump,  Morton  County.     Photograph  by  Rex  Willard. 


302  THE    STORY    OF   THE    PRAIRIES. 

growth  of  many  plants.  It  is  probably  due  in  part  to  the  limestone 
that  has  been  brought  into  our  state  from  Canada  and  ground  to  powder 
and  mixed  with  the  soil  that  North  Dakota  is  noted  as  a  wheat  pro- 
ducing region. 

Calcium  carbonate  in  the  crystalline  form  known  as  Calcite  is  quite 
commonly  found,  and  these  crystals  are  not  infrequently  supposed  to 
be  gems  of  some  kind  by  the  finders,  Iceland  Spar  and  Dog'-tooth  Spar 
are  forms  of  the  crystal  of  common  occurrence. 

Calcium  carbonate  may  be  observed  in  almost  any  gravel  pit,  where 
it  occurs  as  a  white  coating  on  boulders  and  pebbles,  and  often  masses 
of  gravel  and  sand  are  cemented  into  huge  blocks  of  conglomerate  by 
this  mineral.  Small  pebbles  are  frequently  found  clinging  tightly  to 
larger  boulders,  cemented  in  like  manner. 

It  will  be  borne  in  mind  that  this  is  the  mineral  that  forms  the  basis 
of  the  mortar  used  in  the  construction  of  walls  of  brick  and  stone. 
Quick  lime  is  calcium  carbonate  after  the  carbon  and  oxygen  have  been 
driven  off  by  heat,  as  in  the  process  of  burning  in  kilns.  Mortar  is 
formed  by  adding  water,  when  the  lime  slakes  and  sets  or  hardens. 
As  the  mortar  stands  in  the  wall  it  slowly  changes  back  to  its  original 
character  as  calcium  carbonate.  The  cement  that  binds  together  masses 
of  gravel  and  sand  in  gravel  pits  is  natural  mortar. 


CHAPTER  THE  TWENTY-SEVENTH. 

THE  FUTURE  OF  NORTH  DAKOTA. 

Geology  a  Practical  Science. — The  geological  features  of  any  region 
of  country  have  much  to  do  with  the  industries  of  that  region,  and 
determine  in  large  measure  the  value  of  the  lands.  A  farmer  may  or 
may  not  understand  the  geology  of  his  farm,  but  if  he  is  a  successful 
farmer  he  is  controlled  very  largely  in  his  methods  of  farming  by  those 
agricultural  principles  which  have  their  explanation  in  geology.  A 
farmer  knows  in  a  very  practical  way  that  certain  crops  do  well  upon 
certain  soils,  that  others  cannot  be  raised  to  advantage  upon  those 
soils.  Oftentimes  this  knowledge  is  painfully  practical,  because  he  has 
learned  it  at  the  expense  of  much  toil  and  labor.  The  best  knowledge 
in  the  world  is  often  gained  by  experience,  that  is,  by  experiment.  It 
is  because  of  this  that  experimental  stations  or  laboratories  have  been 
established  for  the  study  of  soils,  and  experiment  in  the  best  methods 
of  cultivation  of  crops,  looking  toward  a  better  knowledge  of  the  natu- 
ral resources  of  the  land.  The  laboratory  of  the  landscape  geologist  is 
the  field.  %The  farmer  has  to  do  with  soils,  rain  and  sunshine,  and  hence 
his  laboratory  is  also  the  field.  He  must  be  a  geologist.  He  may  not 
know  it;  he  may  not  believe  in  "science;"  he  may  know  nothing  of 
geology  as  such,  but  he  is  a  practical  geologist,  nevertheless.  In 
buying  a  farm  the  geology  of  that  farm  is  of  much  interest,  not  for  the 
sake  of  the  geology,  but  because  this  determines  for  all  time  certain 
points  of  value  about  the  farm.  A  landscape  is  a  more  complex  thing 
than  is  often  thought,  and  more  things  enter  into  its  character  and  so 
into  the  quality  of  the  fields  determining  their  use  and  value  than  is  by 
many  supposed. 

The  Character  of  the  Lands, — That  there  is  a  large  variety  of  types  of 
landscape  and  a  great  diversity  of  soils  in  North  Dakota  is  apparent 
from  what  has  been  said  in  the  preceding  pages.  The  diversity  in  kinds 
of  soil  as  well  as  in  forms  of  landscape  adapts  the  State  to  a  diversity  of 
farming  interests.  Few  states  offer  a  greater  range  of  opportunities 


304 


THE   STORY   OF  THE   PRAIRIES. 


for  agricultural  pursuits  than  does  North  Dakota.  The  richest  wheat 
lands  in  the  world,  the  most  profitable  flax  and  oat  fields,  ranges  for 
grazing  herds  of  horses,  cattle  and  sheer^,  of  immense  extent,  vast  areas 
of  meadow,  fuel  in  inexhaustible  supply,  clays  suitable  for  brick  for 
building  purposes  unlimited  in  extent,  make  any  forecast  except  that 
of  permanent  prosperity,  under  the  judicious  management  of  an  intelli- 
gent population,  seem  absurd. 

Let  us  briefly  pass  in  review  some  of  the  things  worth  remember- 
ing about  the  landscape  of  North  Dakota. 

The  landscape  owes  its  present  form  in  a  large  measure  to  the  fact 
that  the  Great  Ice-Sheet  spread  over  the  State  and  leveled  down  the 


FIG.  158.  In  the  East  the  Farm  is  cut  up  into  Fields  containing  Acres! 
Photograph  by  McCormick  Harvesting  Machine  Co. 

hills  and  filled  the  valleys,  and  left  the  surface  in  the  form  of  level, 
undulating,  or  rolling  prairies.  The  fertility  of  the  soil  is  due  in  large 
part  to  the  grinding  and  pulverizing  of  the  rocks  by  the  Great  Ice- 
Sheet,  forming  the  finest  of  rock-flour.  No  long,  high,  sweeping  hill- 
sides such  as  are  common  in  the  Eastern  States,  formed  by  the  wearing 
of  streams  during  long  ages,  greet  the  eye  in  North  Dakota.  No 
long  stretches  of  clayey  hard-pan  hillsides  off  from  which  the  fertile 
soil  is  annually  washed  into  the  rivers,  enter  into  the  farm  scenes  in 
this  Northwest  land.  The  land  is  mostly  free  from  stones  in  the  fields 
because  the  rocks  which  were  ploughed  up  by  the  Great  Ice-Sheet 
were  mostly  soft  rocks  which  were  easily  pulverized  into  fine  rock- 


THE  FUTURE  OF  NORTH  DAKOTA. 


305 


FIG,  159.    "Pictured  Rock,"  Fort  Ransom.    After  the  Rocks  Came  Man.     (The  surface 
of  the  boulder  was  polished  by  glacial  action.    The  marks  are  Indian  hieroglyphics. ) 


FIG.  160.    The  Last  Standing  Vestige  of  Old  Fort  Abercrombie. 


306 


THE    STORY    OF    THE    PRAIRIES, 


FIG.  161.    After  the  Aborigines  Came  the  Pioneers.  (Sod  House  Southeast  of  Lisbon.) 


FIG.  162.      Flowing  Well  and  Stock  Barn,  Red  River  Valley.     (This  is  what  man  builds  on 
North  Dakota  soil  after  the  days  of  pioneering  have  passed.) 


THE  FUTURE  OF  NORTH  DAKOTA.  307 

powder  and  soil.  It  is  estimated  that  not  more  than  one-twentieth  as 
many  boulders  strew  the  fields  in  North  Dakota  as  in  the  Eastern 
States  which  were  passed  over  by  the  Great  Ice-Sheet.  The  soil  is 
good  in  North  Dakota  because  the  old  sea-bottom  sediments  of  the 
Cretaceous  formations  contained  those  mineral  "salts"  which  are 
needed  for  the  growth  of  wheat,  flax  and  oats,  and  other  cereal  grains. 
The  same  "alkali"  which  sometimes  renders  the  water  not  good  for 
drinking,  when  present  in  small  quantities  distributed  through  the 


FIG.  163.  In  North  Dakota  it  is  One  Big  Field  containing  Sections ! 
Photograph  by  McCormick  Harvesting  Machine  Co. 

rocks,  helps  to  make  the  great  fertility  of  the  soil.  The  limestone 
which  is  the  surface  rock  in  portions  of  the  Canadian  Provinces  lying 
to  the  north,  and  off  from  which  the  great  ice-plow  broke  vast  quanti- 
ties, which  was  carried  over  into  this  State  and  the  sister  state  of  Min- 
nesota, when  ground  into  rock-powder  forms  the  most  fertile  wheat 
soil  in  the  world.  From  the  circumstance  of  great  bodies  of  water 
standing  upon  portions  of  the  State  in  glacial  lakes  of  large  extent, 
which  have  now  disappeared  and  their  bottoms  become  dry  land,  there 
is  spread  out  the  most  nearly  level  and  among  the  most  productive 
large  areas  of  land  in  the  world.  These  lands  are  level  because  the 
waves  and  currents  of  the  lake  waters  distributed  the  earth  materials 
evenly  over  their  bottoms.  They  are  the  richest  lands  known  because 
the  finest  of  rock-powder  was  carried  by  the  waves  and  currents  and 
distributed  in  layers  over  their  bottoms,  and  the  gathering  of  vegetable 
remains  upon  the  bottoms  of  these  lakes  added  the  black  matter  which 
gives  the  final  touch  of  fertility  to  the  soil  and  makes  it  the  strongest 
crop-producing  soil  known.  These  lake  bottom  lands  are  not  confined 
to  the  eastern  portion  of  the  State  known  as  the  Red  River  Valley,  but 
the  Mouse  River  Valley,  embracing  more  than  one-third  of  a  million 
acres  of  land  within  the  State  of  North  Dakota,  and  the  area  covered 
by  Lake  Sargent,  embracing  most  of  Sargent  County  and  a  portion 


308  THE  STORY   OF  THE  PRAIRIES. 

of  Ransom  County,  and  Lake  Dakota,  covering  a  portion  of  Dickey 
County,  are  Jike  the  Red  River  Valley  in  their  geological  character, 
viz.,  old  lake  bottoms.  The  even  character  of  the  bottoms  of  these 
lakes  leaves  almost  the  entire  area  s-uitable  for  cultivation  in  crop  rais- 
ing and  meadow.  Less  "waste  land"  exists  in  these  portions  of  North 
Dakota  than  in  almost  any  equal  areas  in  any  of  the  Northern  States, 
being  estimated  over  large  areas  not  to  exceed  one-fiftieth  of  the  whole. 

Mineral  Resources.— The  geologic  situation  of  the  State  makes  pos- 
sible the  obtaining  of  abundant  flows  of  artesian  water  over  most  of 
the  entire  eastern  half  if  not,  indeed,  over  the  whole  State,  and  in  all 
parts  of  the  State  water  is  obtained  in  unlimited  supply  from  common 
wells  at  moderate  depths. 

An  inexhaustible  supply  of  coal  underlies  the  surface  of  the  western 
half  of  the  State,  making  abundant  and  cheap  fuel  within  reach  of  all 
citizens  of  the  State.  Railroads  traverse  the  State  so  that  a  never-ceas- 
ing fuel  supply  is  available  at  small  cost  to  the  eastern  half  of  the  State 
from  the  vast  coal  fields  in  the  western  half. 

Clays  suitable  for  the  finest  quality  of  building  brick,  and  for  fire- 
brick and  tile  purposes,  and  also  for  the  finer  processes  of  cement  and 
pottery  manufacture,  lie  but  a  little  beneath  the  surface,  and  within 
easy  reach  of  fuel  for  the  manufacturing  processes. 

Natural  forests  of  growing  timber  abound  along  nearly  all  the 
stream  courses,  and  experience  has  demonstrated  that  groves  of  any 
extent  desired  may  be  grown  by  suitable  cultivation  upon  prairie  lands 
remote  from  the  larger  streams. 

The  Stockman's  Paradise.— Stock  raising  finds  a  paradise  in  the  vast 
pastures  of  natural  prairie  grass,  and  hay  in  almost  unlimited  quantity 
can  be  cut,  during  dry  seasons  on  the  bottoms  of  the  sloughs  and 
marsh-lands,  and  in  wet  seasons  on  the  higher  lands,  which  yield  more 
grass  by  far  than  there  is  stock  of  any  kind  to  eat  during  the  grazing 
season.  The  coulees  or  deep  valleys  in  the  western  portion  of  the  State 
furnish  protection  to  animals  from  the  storms  of  winter  so  that  the 
expense  for  the  construction  of  stables  for  horses  and  cattle,  which 
attends  stock  farming  in  the  East,  is  largely  saved  to  the  ranchman 
farmer  in  North  Dakota. 

That  the  occurrence  of  storms  and  severe  weather  will  bear  favor- 
able comparison  with  other  Northern  States  farther  east  is  shown  by 
the  statistics  of  the  U.  S.  Weather  Bureau  extending  over  the  decades 
since  accurate  records  have  been  kept  in  the  Northwest. 


THE  FUTURE  OF  NORTH  DAKOTA. 


309 


310  THE   STORY   OF  THE   PRAIRIES. 

The  Question  of  Rainfall.— That  the  rainfall  in  North  Dakota  is  suffi- 
cient in  amount  and  distributed  over  the  growing  months  of  the  year 
so  as  generally  under  good  cultivation  to  produce  reasonably  sure-  re- 
turns in  bountiful  harvests  is  shown  by  the  records  of  annual  and 
monthly  rainfall  for  many  years  past. 

The  question  of  rainfall  is  an  important  one  in  any  agricultural  dis- 
trict. To  all  appearances  North  Dakota  has  almost  unlimited  resources 
in  the  matter  of  fertility  of  soil.  Records  of  the  amount  of  rainfall  have 
been  kept  for  many  years.  A  study  of  the  U.  S.  Weather  Bureau  rec- 
ords will  show  that  failure  in  farming,  if  failure  there  be,  is  due  more 
largely  to  careless  or  unscientific  farming  than  to  either  quality  of  soil 
or  amount  of  rainfall.  If  any  one  has  labored  under  the  impression 
that  the  Northwest  is  subject  to  drought  and  hence  is  not  adapted  to 
profitable  farming,  a  study  of  the  climatic  records  will  tend  to  dispel 
that  idea.  The  idea  has  gained  acceptance  that  these  lands  have  good 
soil  but  that  the  rainfall  is  insufficient.  Statistical  figures  compiled 
from  official  sources  tell  their  own  story  of  the  amount  of  rainfall,  and 
largely  outweigh  the  notion  that  the  rainfall  is  scant. 

Thirty  years  ago  a  vast  region  lying  west  of  the  Mississippi  River 
embracing  what  are  now  portions  of  Kansas,  Nebraska,  South  and 
North  Dakota  and  Minnesota — and  some  of  the  best  parts  of  those  now 
great  and  wealthy  states — was  considered  a  great  arid  waste  unfit  for 
cultivation  and  not  capable  of  supporting  an  agricultural  population. 
Tn  fact,  many  citizens  of  those  states  whose  heads  have  silvered  a  little 
as  they  approach  the  latter  half  of  life,  remember  when  they  studied 
about  the  "Great  American  Desert"  in  the  geography  lessons  in  the 
little  schoolhouse  on  a  clay  hillside  in  the  East,  and  were  taught  that 
it  was  a  great  arid  waste — a  vast  wild  and  irreclaimable  buffalo  range, 
best  adapted  to  gophers,  badgers,  wolves,  wild  horses  and  red  men ! 

It  is  said  that  Horace  Greeley,  while  traveling  across  the  barren 
desert  plains  of  Arizona  and  New  Mexico,  said  to  a  friend,  with  char- 
acteristic dry  humor,  that  "all  that  that  country  needed  to  make  it  a 
desirable  place  to  live  was  good  people  and  plenty  of  water."  "Yes," 
remarked  his  facetious  friend,  "all  that  hell  needs  to  make  it  a  desirable 
place  to  live  in  is  the  same  two  things!" 

Western  North  Dakota  has  been  thought  of  by  those  who  know  the 
West  only  through  fanciful  tales  as  needing  good  people  and  plenty 
of  water.  That  the  State  has  room  for  more  good  people,  thrifty,  in- 
dustrious people,  and  that  there  is  a  large  amount  of  land  waiting  for 


THE  FUTURE  OF  NORTH  DAKOTA. 


311 


f 


FIG.  165.    Freeman's  Ranch,  in  Little  Muddy  Valley. 


FIG.  166.    Russian  House  and  Stable.     Photograph  by  Rex  Willard. 


312  THE    STORY    OF   THE    PRAIRIES. 

settlers,  none  will  deny,  but  the  water  it  seems  to  have.  The  geology 
of  the  region  shows  that  the  character  of  the  soil  is  such  as  to  be 
capable  of  a  high  degree  of  productiveness,  and  the  records  bear  out 
the  statement  that  the  rainfall  is  sufficient  under  proper  cultivation 
and  with  intelligent  attention  to  scientific  farming,  with  stock  raising 
and  crop  rotation,  to  insure  large  harvests  and  profitable  returns  from 
general  farming. 

The  Days  of  the  "Great  American  Desert"  No  More — So  far  as  the  great 
Northwest  is  concerned  there  is  no  more  "Great  American  Desert." 
The  phrase  has  given  place  in  modern  geography  to  'The  Bread  Bas- 
ket of  the  World."  It  is  beyond  our  purpose  to  traverse  the  history  of 
the  development  of  the  great  Northwest,  but  the  writer  wishes  herein 
to  record  his  modest  prediction  that  before  another  thirty  years  shall 
have  rolled  around  the  vast  domain  known  as  Western  North  Dakota 
will  be  occupied  by  bona  fide  settlers,  will  be  owned  and  occupied  by 
somebody,  railways  and  highways  will  intersect  it,  schoolhouses  and 
churches — always  an  accompaniment  and  mark  of  American  civiliza- 
tion— will  stand  in  different  parts  of  all  the  counties;  where  are  now 
small  towns  will  be  larger  towns;  what  are  now  prairie  postoffices  at  the 
intersections  of  trails  will  have  grown  to  be  agricultural  and  shipping 
centers.  When  this  region  becomes  settled  with  an  industrious  and 
intelligent  people  who  shall  take  advantage  of  the  conditions  as  they 
are  and  adapt  the  mode  of  cultivation  to  the  character  of  the  lands,  this 
will  become  a  great  and  prosperous  part  of  a  vast  commonwealth.  Di- 
versified farming  will  be  made  successful.  These  lands  are  capable  of 
sustaining  a  great  population.  A  great  population  will  occupy  them. 
Here  wrill  be  the  homes  of  successful  and  well-to-do  farmers,  as  is  now 
the  case  in  the  greater  portion  of  those  states  which  were  once  con- 
sidered to  be  irreclaimable  desert  wastes. 


CHAPTER  THE  TWENTY-EIGHTH. 
GEOLOGY  FROM  A  CAR  WINDOW. 

Prefatory  Note. — The  pleasure  and  the  benefit  to  be  derived  from 
travel  are  not  always  measured  by  the  cost  of  the  journey,  the  distance 
traveled,  or  the  great  cities  passed  through.  A  journey  of  a  hundred 
miles  may  afford  more  real  pleasure  to  the  lover  of  nature  than  a 
thousand  miles  of  travel  to  one  who  simply  endures  the  time  till  he 
arrives  at  the  end  of  his  journey.  There  are  people  to  whom  a  tour 
across  the  continent  is  a  matter  to  be  wished  soon  over  because  there 
is  nothing  to  do  but  to  ride  and  ride  and  wait  for  the  miles  to  roll  by. 
There  are  others  to  whom  every  mile  reveals  something  new,  to  whom 
the  changing  view  is  a  continuous  panorama  of  delight  from  the  begin- 
ning of  the  journey  to  the  end  of  it. 

One  who  cannot  enjoy  pictures  and  statuary  does  not  care  to  visit 
the  art  gallery.  To  one  who  does  not  enjoy  the  beautiful  in  architec- 
ture and  mural  decoration  a  cathedral  is  a  no  more  fitting  place  to  wor- 
ship than  a  hay-barn.  To  one  who  does  not  enjoy  the  beauty  of  the 
landscape,  or  who  does  not  know  the  meaning  of  landscape  gardening, 
who  does  not  recognize  nature's  handiwork  in  the  fashioning  of  land- 
scapes, does  not  derive  the  fullest  value  he  pays  for  when  he  buys  a 
railroad  ticket. 

Just  as  a  guide-book  is  an  indispensable  requisite  to  the  tourist 
abroad,  so  it  is  thought  a  word  about  what  may  be  seen  by  the  way, 
a  description  made  from  the  car  window,  will  help  to  make  more  real 
what  has  been  known  in  a  general  way  before.  Just  as  a  catalogue 
of  the  pictures  and  statuary  in  the  art  gallery  is  helpful  to  the  visitor, 
so  the  traveler  on  a  business  trip  or  the  tourist  in  search  of  health  or 
pleasure  may  get  more  from  his  journey  if  he  has  pointed  out  to  him 
some  of  the  simpler  things  of  the  landscape,  so  that  there  is  added 

313 


314  THE    STORY   OF  THE    PRAIRIES. 

meaning  in  the  hills  and  valleys,  the  forests  and  prairies,  the  sand- 
plains  and  lakes,  a  meaning  which  includes  much  more  than  merely 
seeing  the  things. 

The  notes  which  follow  have  been  gathered  from  observations  ac- 
tually made  from  the  car  window,  the  rear  platform,  the  cupola  of  the 
"caboose,"  or  the  top  of  a  box  car.  This  does  not  mean  that  the  "geol- 
ogizing" which  made  the  notes  possible  was  all  done  from  the  moving 
train.  Many  days  of  field  work  have  been  necessary  to  make  it  possible 
to  interpret  what  could  be  seen  from  the  passing  train.  But  to  make 
the  notes  valuable  for  their  purpose,  and  that  they  should  not  include 
what  could  not  be  actually  seen  by  the  passing  traveler,  the  author  has 
journeyed  over  all  the  lines  of  railroad  here  described  and  made  the 
notes  from  first  hand  observation.  It  is  hoped  that  the  reader  will  find 
these  observations  helpful  as  furnishing  particular  illustrations  of  what 
has  been  said  in  the  text.  The  notes  are  intended  not  only  for  the 
tourist  and  the  traveling  citizen  who  may  be  interested  in  knowing 
what  he  sees  at  the  time  when  he  sees  it,  but  it  is  hoped  that  they  may 
serve  to  give  local  touch  and  color  to  the  descriptions  in  the  body  of 
the  preceding  pages.  As  teachers  and  all  other  persons  who  may  read 
these  pages  travel  more  or  less  it  is  hoped  that  such  notes  may  have 
a  value  in  pointing  out  local  examples  of  landscape  features  and  that 
the  teacher  will  find  some  assistance  in  local  geography  lessons  in  the 
facts  which  are  here  compiled. 

The  figures  following  the  names  of  stations  indicate  the  number  of 
miles  from  the  point  where  the  Red  River  is  crossed  by  the  particular 
line  of  railroad.  The  figures  in  parenthesis  indicate  the  number  of 
miles  east  from  the  point  where  the  line  leaves  the  State,  unless  other- 
wise specified.  The  figures  representing  feet  show  the  altitude  of  each 
station  above  sea-level.  All  the  figures  representing  distances  and  alti- 
tudes are  taken  from  the  official  surveys  of  the  several  railroads.  The 
population  of  all  incorporated  cities,  towns  and  villages,  census  of 
1900,  is  also  given.  County  seats  are  distinguished  by  black  faced  type, 
and  the  station  which  is  nearest  to  the  boundary  line  of  any  county 
traversed  by  the  particular  road  is  indicated. 


THE  GREAT  NORTHERN  LINES.  315 

THE    GREAT    NORTHERN    LINES. 

Grand  Forks — (Grand  Forks  County.)  Distance  from  St.  Paul 
(via  Crookston),  324.1  miles;  distance  east  of  Montana  line,  350  miles. 
Altitude,  835  feet.  Population,  7,652. 

Grand  Forks,  on  the  Red  River  of  the  North,  is  surrounded  by  the 
level  black  plain  of  the  axis  of  the  bottom  of  Lake  Agassiz.  The  prairie 
from  here  to  the  International  Boundary,  eighty  miles  north,  falls  only 
a  little  more  than  seven  inches  to  the  mile.  At  the  time  of  the  highest 
stage  of  Lake  Agassiz,  i.  e.,  when  the  highest  Herman  Beach  was  being 
formed,  the  water  was  probably  more  than  300  feet  deep  where  the  city 
now  stands. 

OJATA. — Distance  from  Grand  Forks,  n.i  miles.  (Distance  east 
of  the  Montana  line,  338.9  miles. )  Altitude,  864  feet.  ; 

Level  prairie,  with  alkaline  marshes.  Two  miles  west  the  prairie 
becomes  broken  into  irregular  hummocks  six  to  eight  feet  high.  These 
mark  the  place  of  the  lower  Ojata  Beach.  The  shore  sand  has  been  piled 
by  the  wind  into  small  dunes.  A  little  farther  west  the  upper  Ojata 
Beach  rises  about  twenty  feet,  sloping  at  first,  then  rising  quite  suddenly. 

EMERADO.— 15.6  miles.  (334.4  miles.)  Altitude,  910  feet.  Popu- 
lation, 236. 

The  Emerado  Beach  is  crossed  one-fourth  mile  east,  about  ten  feet 
high.  Hillsboro  Beach,  two  miles  west,  just  after  crossing  Hazen  Creek. 
The  east  side  of  the  beach  rises  as  a  beautiful  slope,  falling  again  a  little 
west  of  its  crest. 

ARVILLA. — 21.0  miles.  (329.0  miles.)  Altitude,  1,022  feet.  Popu- 
lation, 199. 

The  front  of  the  Elk  Valley  Delta  rises  distinctly  to  view,  from  south 
window  of  car.  Within  a  mile  east  of  Arvilla  two  conspicuous  beaches 
are  crossed,  the  McCauleyville  and  the  Campbell,  lying  near  together. 
The  railroad  makes  a  deep  cut  in  crossing  these.  A  gravel  pit  has  been 
opened  north  of  the  track  from  which  beach  sand  and  gravel  are  taken. 
.The  McCauleyville  Beach  rises  eighteen  feet,  falling  a  little  west  of  its 
crest,  then  the  Campbell  Beach  rises  twenty-five  feet,  falling  about  one- 
third  of  this  west  of  its  crest,  to  the  level  prairie.  A  fine  view  of  the 
delta  front  is  afforded  from  the  south  window,  and  the  deep  valley  of  the 
Turtle  River  from  the  north  window. 

The  Tintah  Beach  is  crossed  two  miles  west,  where  it  runs  along  the 
delta  front.  The  railroad  here  ascends  upon  the  delta-plain  by  a  heavy- 


316  THE   STORY   OF   THE   PRAIRIES. 

grade.  Farther  west,  long,  low  hills  represent  the  Norcross  Shore-Line, 
the  beach  sand  having  been  piled  into  low  dunes  by  the  wind. 

LARIMORE. — 27.7  miles.  (322.3  miles.)  Altitude,  1,138  feet.  Pop- 
ulation, 1,235. 

Larimore  stands  upon  the  crest  of  the  Elk  Valley  Delta,  the  plain  of 
which  is  here  about  eight  miles  wide.  The  highest  Herman  Beach  is 
four  miles  west,  skirting  the  highland.  Two  lower  Herman  Beaches 
pass  near  the  city,  skirting  its  eastern  suburbs.  North  of  the  city  these 
beaches  are  crossed  by  the  Turtle  River,  beyond  which  they  rise  as  a  long, 
low  hill. 

Traveling  westward  it  will  be  noticed  that  a  broad,  level  plain  ex- 
tends to  the  north.  This  is  the  mouth  of  the  Elk  Valley,  and  was  the 
bed  of  the  great  glacial  Elk  River,  which  formed  the  delta  in  Lake  Agas- 
siz.  On  the  western  side  of  this  valley  is  the  Herman  Beach,  marking 
the  highest  shore  of  Lake  Agassiz.  An  extensive  gravel  pit  has  been 
opened  in  this  beach  near  the  railroad.  As  the  ascent  is  made  up  the 
face  of  the  highland  to  the  west  a  fine  view  is  afforded  of  the  mouth  of 
Elk  Valley,  "The  Ridge,"  which  forms  its  eastern  side,  north  of  Mc- 
Canna,  and  the  Norcross  Shore-Line  south  of  the  Ridge.  A  ride  on 
the  rear  platform  is  here  worth  while,  for  a  few  miles. 

NIAGARA. — 41.7  miles.      (308.3  miles.)     Altitude,  1,444  feet- 

In  a  distance  of  eight  miles  an  ascent  of  more  than  300  feet  is  made, 
to  Niagara.  This  is  the  Manitoba  t  Escarpment,  the  southern  continua- 
tion of  the  Pembina  Mountain  Highland.  Rounded,  irregular  hills,  very 
different  from  anything  which  has  been  seen  in  the  Red  River  Valley, 
occur  on  both  sides  of  the  track.  These  are  morainic  hills,  and  belong 
to  the  Ninth,  or  Leaf  Hills,  Moraine.  Many  granite  boulders  are  no- 
ticed, and  sloughs  and  ponds  such  as  are  common  among  the  hills  of  a 
terminal  moraine,  are  frequent. 

PETERSBURG. —  (Nelson  County),  47.9  miles.  (302.1  miles.)  Alti- 
tude, 1,527  feet.  Population,  182. 

MICHIGAN  CITY. — 53.7  miles.  (296.3  miles.)  Altitude,  1,523  feet. 
Population,  309. 

In  the  distance^  north  the  higher  knobs  of  the  Itasca  (Tenth)  Moraine 
can  be  seen.  Many  small  lakes  and  grassy  sloughs  dot  the  prairie, — 
glacial  "pans"  which  show  the  undrained  character  of  the  landscape.  A 
belt  of  high  rounded  knobs  is  crossed  a  little  west  of  Michigan. 

MAPES. — 58.4  miles.     (291.6  miles.)     Altitude,  1,531  feet. 

One  of  the  principal  ranges  of  the  Itasca  Moraine  lies  north  one 


THE  GREAT  NORTHERN  LINES.  317 

mile.  Same  seen  in  distance  north  of  Michigan  City.  Crosses  line  of 
railroad  near  Lakota,  and  continues  to  the  Odessa  Narrows  of  Devils 
Lake. 

Lakota. — 64.0  miles.  (286.0  miles.)  Altitude,  1,520  feet.  Popula- 
tion, 576. 

The  Itasca  Moraine  is  about  a  mile  wide  where  crossed  by  the  rail- 
road, just  west  of  Lakota.  It  is  a  fine  example  of  a  morainic  "range." 
It  is  followed  by  undulating  prairie  again  farther  west.  Before  reach- 
ing Bartlett  another  range  of  low  hills  of  this  moraine  is  crossed. 

BARTLETT. — (Ramsey  County),  68.0  miles.  (282.0  miles.)  Alti- 
tude, 1,536  feet. 

Many  small  shallow  lakes  dot  the  prairies  between  the  moraines.  In 
summer  these  are  often  "dry"  lakes,  with  sheets  of  white  alkaline  salts 
covering  their  bottoms.  The  rounded  knobs  of  another  large  range  of 
the  Itasca  Moraine  can  be  seen  in  the  distance  north.  A  branch  connect- 
ing the  moraine  north  with  the  one  which  was  crossed  at  Lakota,  lies  in 
north  and  south  direction  across  the  line  of  the  railroad  east  of  Sidney 
station.  West  of  Sidney  is  another  similar  range. 

CRARY. — 77.9  miles.  (272.1  miles.)  Altitude,  1,490  feet.  Popu- 
lation, 284. 

East  of  Crary  a  finely  developed  range,  another  branch  connecting 
the  two  principal  moraines  mentioned.  West  of  Crary  a  few  miles  is 
another  range,  with  fine  rounded  hills,  and  little  basins  filled  with  water. 
These  hills  and  hollows  continue  west  of  Keith  station.  The  hills  and 
hollows  have  the  appearance  of  having  been  formed  by  the  dumping  of 
giant  loads  of  earth  from  gigantic  wheelbarrows !  This  is  a  good  exam- 
ple of  a  terminal,  or  "dump,"  moraine. 

Devils  Lake — 88.5  miles.  (261.5  miles.)  Altitude,  1,468  feet 
Population,  1,729. 

Along  the  line  for  fifteen  miles  approaching  the  city  the  high  hills 
south  of  Devils  Lake  can  be  seen  against  the  sky.  Devils  Heart,  the 
highest  of  all,  holds  its  summit  175  feet  above  its  base,  and  290  feet 
above  the  level  of  the  water  of  the  lake.  Eight  miles  west,  and  about 
nine  miles  south  of  the  city,  is  Sully's  Hill,  rising  275  feet  above  the 
ilake.  Fine  groves  of  oak,  elm,  linden,  and  cottonwood  grow  on  the 
bluffs  about  the  lake.  In  one  of  these  groves,  on  a  morainic  swell  on  the 
north  shore  of  the  lake,  the  North  Dakota  Chautauqua  grounds  are 
located,  one  of  the  prettiest  places  in  the  State. 

The  City  of  Devils  Lake  stands  upon  the  low  hills  of  a  moraine,  one 


318  THE    STORY    OF    THE    PRAIRIE^. 

of  the  branches  of  the  Itasca  Moraine.  The  hills  of  one  of  the  principal 
ranges  of  this  moraine  are  seen  about  two  miles  north  of  the  city. 

GRAND  HARBOR. — 95.8  miles.      (254.2  miles.)     Altitude,  1,460  feet. 

The  large  morainic  range  seen  north  of  Devils  Lake  is  crossed  at 
Grand  Harbor,  the  town  being  built  upon  the  rounded  knobs  of  this  mo- 
raine. The  railroad  crosses  another  branch  half  way  between  Devils 
Lake  and  Grand  Harbor.  The  bluffs  which  indent  the  lake,  and  which 
are  generally  tree-covered,  are  the  ends  of  these  smaller  moraines  which 
are  too  high  to  be  covered  by  the  waters  of  the  lake. 

PENN. — 101.7  miles.     (248.3  miles.)     Altitude,  1,473  ^ee^- 

Gently  undulating  prairie,  enclosed  in  a  wide  loop  of  the  moraine 
which  was  crossed  at  Grand  Harbor,  the  western  side  of  the  loop  being 
crossed  two  miles  west  of  Churches  Ferry. 

CHURCHES  FERRY. — 107.4  miles.  (242.6  miles.)  Altitude,  1,464 
feet.  Population,  264. 

Splendid  level  prairie,  among  the  finest  in  the  State  and  the  northwest. 
The  Mauvaise  Coulee  (meaning  ''Bad  Valley")  is  an  old  glacial  drainage 
way  which  now  connects  the  lakes  to  the  north  with  Devils  Lake  in  time 
of  high  water.  This  was  the  outlet  stream  of  Glacial  Lake  Souris  when 
that  lake  drained  into  Devils  Lake  and  the  Sheyenne  River. 


ST.   JOHN   BRANCH. 

Cando — (Towner  County),  15.4  miles  north  of  Churches  Ferry. 
(43.5  miles  south  of  International  Boundary.)  Altitude,  1,488  feet. 
Population,  1,061. 

Cando  is  located  on  the  broad  and  fertile  prairie  which  extends  from 
the  loop  in  the  range  of  hills  south  of  Grand  Harbor  and  Churches  Ferry 
north  and  west  to  the  Turtle  Mountains.  About  eight  miles  north  and 
east  lies  one  of  the  ranges  of  the  Itasca  Moraine,  about  five  miles  in 
width,  which  extends  northwest  across  the  Turtle  Mountains,  and  south- 
east nearly  to  Lakota,  thence  northeast  along  the  highland  west  of  Con- 
way  and  Inkster. 

Holla.—  (Rolette  County),  47.4  miles.  (11.5  miles.)  Altitude 
1,823  feet.  Population,  400. 

About  six  miles  south  of  Rolla  the  railroad  crosses  the  moraine  re- 
ferred,to.  About  six  miles  northwest,  the  plateau  of  the  Turtle  Moun- 
tains rises  suddenly  against  the  horizon,  having  a  height  here  of  300  to 
400  feet  above  the  prairie. 


THE  GREAT  NORTHERN  LINES.     ,  319 

ST.  JOHN. — 54.8  miles.  (4.0  miles.)  Altitude,  1,950  feet.  Popula- 
tion, 1 68. 

City  located  on  eastern  slope  of  the  Mountains.  Deep  coulees  inter- 
sect the  sides  of  the  plateau.  Morainic  hills,  of  the  range  crossed  ten 
to  twelve  miles  south,  three  miles  west.  Mountain  top  clad  with  forests. 
##•*##***#** 

LEEDS. —  (Benson  County),  119.0  miles.  (231.0  miles.)  Altitude, 
1,516  feet.  Population,  349. 

Big  Butte,  or  Mauvais  Butte,  rises  with  broad  sweeping  outlines  six 
or  seven  miles  south.  This  immense  hill  is  about  ten  miles  in  length, 
rising  150  to  200  feet  above  the  surrounding  prairie  at  its  eastern  end, 
and  250  to  300  feet  in  its  western  portion.  This  is  an  old  hill,  i.  e., 
it  was  a  hill  before  the  Ice  Age,  as  is  shown  by  the  fact  that  morainic 
ridges  cross  its  surface  and  many  boulders  lie  scattered  upon  it.  It  be- 
longs in  the  class  of  hills  such  as  Devils  Heart  and  Sully's  Hill,  south  of 
Devils  Lake. 

Occasional  morainic  hills  stand  upon  the  flat  landscape  between  the 
Big  Butte  and  the  railroad.  A  well  marked,  broad  glacial  drainage 
channel  west  of  Leeds.  Only  a  small  stream  in  it  now. 

YORK. — 125.3  miles.     (224.7  miles.)     Altitude,  1,619  feet. 

The  high  western  end  of  Big  Butte  rises  in  the  southeast.  Its  sur- 
face is  seen  in  the  distance  to  be  rough,  and  marked  by  coulees  and  mo- 
rainic hills.  The  prairie  between  Leeds  and  York  is  undulating,  with  an 
occasional  round,  morainic  knob  standing  like  a  great  mound  upon  the 
generally  flat  landscape.  A  school  house  stands  on  the  top  of  one  of 
these  knobs,  just  south  of  the  railroad.  Many  fine  hay-meadows  occur 
in  the  shallow  depressions. 

KNOX. — 131.1  miles.     (218.9  miles.)    Altitude,  1,610  feet 

Fine  example  of  moraine  crossed  east  of  Knox.  Along  the  horizon 
in  the  west,  the  high  knobs  and  ridges  of  the  combined  Fergus  Falls 
(Eighth)  and  Leaf  Hills  (Ninth)  Moraines,  the  town  standing  upon  a 
beautiful,  gently  undulating  prairie.  A  fine  view  of  a  moraine  is 
afforded  from  the  south  window  of  the  car,  west  of  Knox.  The  higher 
rounded  hills  of  another  moraine  seen  in  the  distance  north. 

About  two  miles  west  is  the  highest  point  of  the  Great  Northern 
Railway  between  the  Red  River  of  the  North  and  the  eastern  slope  of  the 
Missouri  Plateau,  1,660  feet.  This  is  the  "divide"  between  Devils 
Lake  and  the  Sheyenne  on  the  east,  and  the  Mouse  River  on  the  west.  It 
can  hardly  be  called  a  watershed,  for  the  land  in  this  region  is  undrained 


320  «    THE   STORY   OF   THE    PRAIRIES. 

by  streams.  Drainage  courses  have  not  had  time  to. become  established 
since  the  Glacial  Period. 

PLEASANT  LAKE. — 136.7  miles.  (213.3  miles.)  Altitude,  1,608 
feet 

The  change  from  the  gently  undulating  prairie  to  the  extremely  irreg- 
ular topography  of  the  morainic  belt  which  is  here  entered,  is  very 
marked.  The  hills  are  steep  and  rugged,  and  strewn  with  boulders.  A 
typical  morainic  region.  This  belt  of  hills,  the  compound  Fergus  Falls 
and  Leaf  Hills  Moraines,  crosses  the  Indian  Reservation  south  of  Devils 
Lake,  the  two  moraines  continuing  separately  from  the  hilly  region  south 
of  Devils  Lake  across  Nelson,  Steele,  and  Barnes  Counties,  and  thence, 
after  crossing  the  Red  River  Valley,  where  they  are  recognized  only  as 
slight  undulations,  they  continue  across  Minnesota,  and  become  a  part  of 
the  great  "Kettle  Moraine"  in  Wisconsin,  Illinois,  Michigan,  and  Indi- 
ana, and  extending  east  to  the  Atlantic  Ocean  near  New  York  City. 
The  higher  hills,  which  lie  along  either  side  of  the  railroad,  rise  from 
fifty  to  one  hundred  feet  above  the  hollows  at  their  bases,  and  from  100  to 
150  feet  above  the  general  level  of  the  prairie  outside  the  moraine. 
Scores  and  hundreds  of  lakes  of  all  sizes,  from  small  ponds  up  to  lakes 
two  miles  in  diameter,  occupy  the  hollows  between  the  hills.  Which  one 
of  the  great  number  which  lie  within  a  few  miles  is  the  most  "pleasant" 
would  be  hard  to  say.  South  of  Pleasant  Lake  station  is  Broken  Bone 
Lake,  named  from  the  piles  of  broken  buffalo  bones  which  were  left  on 
its  shores  by  the  Indians,  from  the  manufacture  of  "pemmican,"  in  which 
the  marrow  of  the  bones  was  used. 

Rugby. —  (Pierce  County),  145.7  miles.  (204.3  miles.)  Altitude, 
1,567  feet.  Population,  487. 

Rugby  stands  where  was  the  eastern  shore  of  Old  Lake  Souris.  The 
aspect  of  the  prairie  suddenly  changes  to  the  west.  The  rolling  and  hilly 
landscape  gives  way  to  a  broad,  gently  swelling  prairie.  The  hilly  mo- 
raines stop  abruptly  at  the  shore  of  the  old  lake.  The  hills  were  depos- 
ited upon  the  lake  bottom  just  as  they  were  beyond  its  shores,  but  they 
were  leveled  down  by  the  action  of  the  waves.  From  Rugby  to  Minot 
the  railroad  crosses  the  bottom  of  Lake  Souris  in  the  same  manner  as  the 
western  half  of  the  bottom  of  Lake  Agassiz  was  crossed  from  Grand 
Forks  to  Larimore.  High  morainic  hills  are  seen  both  north  and  south 
of  Rugby.  The  region  about  the  city  was  occupied  by  a  bay  of  the  lake. 
A  long  slough  lying  north  of  the  railroad  can  be  traced  from  the  car  win- 
dow most  of  the  way  between  Pleasant  Lake  and  Rugby.  This  is  the 


THE  GREAT  NORTHERN  LINES. 


old  channel  of  a  glacial  stream  which  flowed  into  Lake  Souris  from  the 
melting  ice  at  the  time  the  moraine  about  Pleasant  Lake  was  being 
formed. 


BOTTINEAU   BRANCH. 

WILLOW  CITY. — (Bottineau  County),  21.2  miles  from  Rugby.  (36.9 
miles  south  of  the  International  Boundary.)  Altitude,  1,478  feet/ 
Population,  476. 

The  railroad  runs  near  the  eastern  shore,  on  the  Lake  Souris  bottom. 
The  horizon  line  to  the  east  is  an  irregular  line,  marked  by  the  crests 
of  the  hills  and  ridges,  and  the  deep  intervening  hollows.  To  the  west 
the  sky  meets  the  earth  upon  an  almost  unbroken  horizontal  line,  the 
nearly  level  surface  of  the  old  lake  bottom. 

O'MEMEE. — 30.4  miles.  (27.7  miles.)  Altitude,  1,545  feet.  Popu- 
lation, 320. 

East  of  Willow  City  and  Omemee  the  undulations  of  the  prairie  rise 
often  ten  feet  above  the  adjoining  hollows.  These  swells  are  the  mo- 
rainic  hills  which  were  not  entirely  leveled  down  by  the  waves  of  the  lake. 
The  high  and  rugged  hills  of  the  same  moraines  beyond  the  lake  shore 
show  how  much  the  action  of  the  waves  leveled  the  hills  which  were 
deposited  in  the  waters  of  the  lake. 

Bottineau. — 38.1  miles.  (20  miles.)  Altitude,  1,646  feet.  Pop- 
ulation, 888. 

Bottineau  stands  upon  the  lake  bottom,  about  four  miles  from  where 
the  waters  washed  the  base  of  the  Turtle  Mountains.  The  Turtle  Moun- 
tain Plateau  rises  400  to  600  feet  above  the  level  of  the  prairie  at  Bot- 
tineau. The  highest  hills  on  the  top  of  the  plateau,  Butte  St.  Paul  and 
Bear  Butte,  rise  700  and  600  feet,1  respectively,  above  the  prairie  at  the 
foot  of  the  plateau,  or  Mountains.2 

SOURIS. — 52.1  miles.     (6  miles.)     Altitude  (about),  1,550  feet. 

West  of  Bottineau  is  a  group  of  morainic  hills  which  seemed  to  be 
too  large  to  be  leveled  by  the  waves  of  the  lake.  They  probably  formed 
an  island,  or  a  group  of  islands,  during  the  receding  stages  of  the  lake. 
Souris  is  on  the  nearly  level  prairie  of  the  deeper  lake  bottom. 


1  Andreas'  Atlas  of  Dakota. 

2  The  U.  S.  Boundary  Commission  gives  the  highest  point  of  the  Turtle  Mountains 
as  2,534  feet  above  sea  level. 


322  THE  STORY  OF  THE  PRAIRIES. 

BERWICK. —  (McHenry  County),  157.4  miles.  (192.6  miles.)  Alti- 
tude, 1,487  feet. 

West  from  Rugby  the  railroad  grade  falls  rapidly  from  the  shore  of 
the  old  lake  toward  its  center.  From  the  north  window,  or  better,  from 
the  rear  platform,  the  ends  of  the  high  moraines  can  be  distinctly  seen 
along  the  shore,  cut  off  abruptly  by  the  waves  of  the  lake.  North,  and 
south,  of  the  railroad,  ranges  of  low,  broad  hills,  with  gracefully  curv- 
ing outlines,  are  the  continuation  of  the  moraines  south  of  Rugby,  across 
the  lake  bottom.  They  all  have  a  trend  northwest  by  west,  so  that  they 
appear  to  approach  the  railroad  from  the  south,  and  diverge  to  the  north. 
Fine  nearly  level  prairies  lie  between  these  long  ground-swells.  A  mo- 
raine of  sandy  hills  is  marked  by  dunes  farther  west. 

Towner — 164.7  miles.  (185.3  miles.)  Altitude,  1,482  feet.  Pop- 
ulation, 331. 

Towner  is  on  the  lowest  part  of  the  old  lake  bottom  crossed  by  the 
Great  Northern  Railway.  The  valley  of  the  river,  i.  e.,  the  trough  cut  by 
the  river,  is  very  small  here  compared  with  the  broad  and  deep  valley 
west  of  Minot.  Here  it  is  a  small  valley,  cut  since  the  lake  disappeared. 
At  Minot  and  westward  the  large  valley  was  eroded  by  the  great  glacial 
river  which  emptied  into  Lake  Souris. 

DENBIGH. — 173.4  miles.     (176.6  miles.)    Altitude,  1,520  feet. 

Choppy  sand  hills,  wind-drifted.  High,  ragged  dunes,  morainic  hills 
of  sand  partly  leveled  by  the  waves  of  the  lake,  and  modified  by  the  action 
of  the  wind.  Higher  hills,  grass  covered,  are  more  clayey,  and  so  not 
affected  by  the  winds.  Medicine  Lodge  Hill,  and  Buffalo  Lodge,  seen 
from  the  north  window,  are  morainic  hills  which  were  too  large  to  be 
leveled  by  the  lake.  They  were  at  one  time  islands  in  Lake  Souris. 
Tracts  of  dunes,  sparsely  covered  with  scrubby  timber,  and  alkaline  lakes, 
lie  along  the  course  of  this  moraine. 

About  a  mile  north  of  the  railroad,  west  of  Riga  station,  is  a  high 
morainic  hill,  its  crest  irregular  in  form,  grass  covered,  and  abruptly  cut 
off  at  its  eastern  end.  This  was  an  island  in  the  lake,  as  is  shown  by  the 
form  of  the  hill,  for  its  crest  has  not  been  made  smooth  by  the  waves. 
Its  eastern  end  was  washed  away  by  the  waves,  hence  the  level  plain  sur- 
rounding it. 

GRANVILLE. — 185.1  miles.      (164.9  miles.)     Altitude,   1,516  feet. 

Range  of  morainic  hills  west,  their  outlines  smoothed  and  rounded  by 
the  waves,  but  not  leveled  much.  Little  bumpy  dunes  of  sand,  the  sandy 
character  of  the  hills  being  due  to  the  ploughing  up  of  the  Fox  Hills 


THE  GREAT  NORTHERN  LINES.  323 

Sandstone  by  the  ice-sheet,  and  ground  up  and  deposited  as  a  moraine 
in  the  lake.  Nearly  level  prairies  lie  in  the  broad  tracts  between  the  mo- 
raines. 

NORWICH. — 192.2  miles.      (157.8  miles.)     Altitude,  1,531  feet. 

Town  built  on  hills  of  moraine.  Hills  modified  in  outline  by  action 
of  lake  waters,  giving  them  a  beautifully  curved  contour.  Moraine 
crosses  railroad  from  southeast  to  northwest.  Splendid  prairie,  nearly 
level,  both  east  and  west  of  this  moraine. 

SURREY. — (Ward  County),  198.9  miles.  (151.1  miles.)  Altitude, 
1,635  feet- 
Steep  slope  of  the  western  side  of  the  valley  of  the  Mouse  River  can 
be  seen  to  the  west,  from  south  window.  Prairie  here  intersected  by 
coulees  leading  into  the  Mouse. 

Minot — 206.3  miles.  (143.7  miles.)  Altitude,  1,562  feet.  Popu- 
lation, 1,277. 

Minot  stands  at  the  western  edge,  or  shore,  of  Lake  Sour  is,  in  a  ba> 
formed  by  the  broad  mouth  of  the  Mouse  River,  where  that  great  glacial 
stream  emptied  its  waters,  collected  from  the  melting  ice-sheet,  into  Lake 
Souris.  The  valley  of  the  Mouse  is  here  more  than  a  mile  wide,  and  its 
banks  on  either  side  are  hills  rising  150  feet  or  more  to  the  level  of  the 
adjacent  prairie.  The  valley  is  here  many  times  larger  than  the  same 
valley  sixty  miles  farther  down  its  course  at  Towner.  Many  coulees,  or 
little  tributaries,  have  cut  into  the  valley  sides  giving  a  beautiful  combed, 
or  grooved,  appearance.  Viewed  from  the  bottom  of  the  valley  the  land- 
scape on  either  side-  appears  hilly.  The  coulees  which  mark  the  banks 
are  little  notches  cut  by  the  rains  which  flow  into  the  valley  from  the 
prairie.  Some  of  these  have  worked  back  into  the  landscape  several 
miles. 

About  four  miles  west  of  Minot  is  the  junction  of  the  Mouse  and  Des 
Lacs  Rivers.  Both  these  streams  are  now  small,-  but  their  valleys  are 
broad  and  deep.  They  are  glacial  valleys,  cut  when  the  waters  from  the 
melting  ice-sheet  kept  the  streams  at  high  flood.  ( See  Tenth  Chapter. ) 

DES  LACS.— ^220.0  miles.      (130.0  miles.)     Altitude,  1,902  feet. 

Railroad  ascends  by  heavy  grade  to  the  high  prairie  west  of  the 
Mouse  Valley,  rising  339  feet  in  less  than  fourteen  miles.  A  fine  view 
of  the  broad  Valley  of  the  Mouse  is  afforded  from  the  north  window. 
The  view  from  the  rear  platform  will  repay  the  inconvenience.  A  deep 
coulee  is  spanned  by  a  high  iron  bridge  four  miles  west,  beyond  which 
the  grade  rises  through  many  cuts  to  the  prairie  at  Des  Lacs.  Fine  ex- 


324  THE  STORY  OF  THE  PRAIRIES. 

amples  of  coulees,  or  "young  valleys,"  deep  troughs  with  steep  sides, 
are  best  seen  from  south  window.  The  great  Missouri  Plateau  rises 
against  the  western  horizon  fifteen  miles  distant. 

BERTHOLD. — 229.2  miles.      (120.8  miles.)     Altitude,  2,087  feet. 

A  vast  evenly  sloping  prairie,  rising  quite  rapidly  toward  the  Plateau 
front,  extends  as  far'as  the  eye  can  reach,  to  the  northwest  and  southeast. 

TAGUS  (or  Wallace). —238.8  miles.  (111.2  miles.)  Altitude,  2,187 
feet. 

Here  is  the  front  of  the  Missouri  Plateau,  or  Coteau  du  Missouri. 
The  Outer  or  Altamont  Moraine  lies  upon  the  eastern  edge  of  the  plateau. 
Rounded  hills  and  many  small  lakes  mark  the  rough  morainic  topogra- 
phy. A  small  lake  having  a  distinct  wave-worn  cliff,  and  a  shore-boul- 
der chain  at  its  foot,  lies  near  the  station. 

DELTA. — 245.4  miles.      (104.6  miles.)     Altitude,  2,263  ^eet- 

Delta  is  on  the  top  of  the  plateau,  700  feet  higher  than  Minot,  forty 
miles  east.  The  high,  steep,  and  boulder-strewn  hills  illustrate  finely  the 
landscape  of  a  terminal  moraine.  Many  small  lakes  and  sloughs  at  dif- 
ferent levels,  without  outlets. 

PALERMO. — 252.6  miles.      (97.4  miles.)     Altitude,  2,200  feet. 

Station  stands  at  western  edge  of  the  Altamont  Moraine,  which  is 
here  about  ten  miles  wide.  The  landscape  is  a  rolling  prairie  westward. 
No  more  morainic  hills  will  be  seen  farther  west,  for  here  was  the  limit 
of  the  western  movement  of  the  great  ice-sheet.  Boulders  and  glacial 
gravels  occur  as  far  as  the  Missouri  River,  "over-wash"  materials  from 
the  Outer  Moraine,  or  else  deposits  from  the  older  ice-sheet,  which  is 
often  spoken  of  as  the  "Old  Drift."1 

STANLEY. — 260.7  miles.     (89.3  miles.)     Altitude,  2,253  ^eet- 

The  vast  upland  prairie  of  the  Coteau  du  Missouri.  Many  alkaline 
lakes  in  shallow  basins.  Fine  grazing  lands;  hay-meadows  dotted  with 
stacks. 

WHITE  EARTH. — 279.9  miles.      (70.1  miles.)     Altitude,  2,092  feet. 

1  By  "  Old  Drift"  is  meant  the  materials  left  upon  the  surface  by  an  older  ice- 
sheet,  which  belonged  to  an  earlier  epoch  of  the  Glacial  Period.  This  earlier  ice  inva- 
sion extended  farther  west  in  North  Dakota  than  did  the  great  Ice- Sheet  by  which  the 
moraines  described  in  this  book  were  formed.  The  Altamont  Moraine,  the  outermost 
of  those  formed  by  the  later  Ice-Sheet,  nowhere  occurs  west  of  the  Missouri  River,  but 
the  Older  Drift  extends  as  a  thin  mantle  to  a  distance,  as  usually  mapped,  of  40  to  60 
miles  west  of  the  river.  The  drift  may  have  extended  farther  west,  however,  and  have 
been  carried  away  by  erosion  since  the  disappearance  of  the  ice.  The  writer  has  ob- 
served what  seemed  to  be  drift  pebbles  100  miles  west  of  the  Missouri  River  at  Dickin- 
son, and  nearly  40  miles  still  farther  west,  85  miles  south  of  the  Missouri  River  at 
Williston,  on  the  tops  of  buttes  in  the  valley  of  the  Little  Missouri  River,  10  miles  south 
of  Medora,  what  appeared  to  be  drift  deposits  occurred  to  a  depth  of  8  to  12  feet, 
rounded  pebbles  of  quartzite  and  granite  up  to  5  or  6  inches  in  diameter  being  observed, 


THE  GREAT  NORTHERN  LINES.  325 

The  Valley  of  White  Earth  Creek  has  been  cut  down  150  feet  into  the 
plain.  Strata  of  whitish  sandstone  and  clay  exposed%  in  the  naked  sides 
of  the  valley,  Hence  the  name.  Springs,  which  burst  out  of  the  hillsides 
of  this  and  similar  deep  valleys,  are  of  much  value  to  the  ranchmen. 
Protection  is  also  afforded  for  stock  during  the  winter  season  in  these 
deep  valleys.  The  only  town  between  Minot  and  Williston  is  this.  All 
the  other  stations  are  names  upon  the  map  merely. 

TIOGA. — (Williams  County),  287.9  miles.  (62.1  miles.)  Altitude, 
2,237  feet. 

The  high  prairie  again  reached,  after  traversing  the  course  of  a  side 
coulee  of  White  Earth  Creek. 

WHEELOCK. — 305.4  miles.      (44.6  miles.)     Altitude,  2,380  feet. 

Highest  point  of  the  Great  Northern  Railway  in  the  State.  The 
higher  points  on  the  prairie  rise  to  an  elevation  above  sea-level  of  2,500 
to  2,600  feet,  which  is  more  than  1,000  feet  higher  than  the  plain  of  the 
Mouse  Valley  where  it  is  crossed  by  the  railroad  100  miles  east. 

SPRING  BROOK. — 316.0  miles.      (34.0  miles.)     Altitude,  2,066  feet. 

Railroad  descends  more  than  500  feet  in  a  distance  of  a  little  more 
than  twrenty  miles,  to  the  Valley  of  the  Missouri  River,  crossing  and  re- 
crossing  the  channel  of  Stony  Creek. 

Williston — 327.3  miles.  (22.7  miles.)  Altitude,  1,859  feet-  Pop- 
ulation, 763. 

High,  steep,  naked  butte-like  hills  south  of  the  river.  River  channel 
meanders  over  a  broad  belt  of  changing  sand-bars.  Dense  forest  of  red 
willows  and  heavy  timber  along  the  river,  the  favorite  haunt  of  deer  and 
other  wild  game.  The  city  stands  upon  a  terrace  formed  by  a  glacial 
stream  which  spreads  as  a  belt  of  gravel  and  sand  for  a  distance  of  more 
than  thirty  miles  along  the  course  of  Little  Muddy  Creek.  The  bottom 
land  of  the  valley  is  about  thirty  feet  lower  than  the  ' 'bench"  or  terrace, 
and  the  Little  Muddy  flows  in  a  small  channel  on  the  "bottom."  So 
slight  is  the  fall  of  this  flat  bottom  that  an  irrigation  ditch  eleven  miles  in 
length  is  necessary  to  raise  the  water  out  of  the  small  channel  to  the  level 
meadow  bottom-land  at  the  mouth  of  the  valley. 

BUFORD. — 348.0  miles.     (2.0  miles.)     Altitude,  1,950  feet. 

Railroad  follows  the  picturesque  valley  of  the  Missouri.  South  and 
west  rise  the  naked  walls  of  the  buttes,  cut  in  the  high  prairie  by  the 
mighty  rivers,  the  Missouri  and  Yellowstone.  The  two  rivers  meet  be- 
yond the  plain  south  of  the  station. 


326  THE  STORY  OF  THE  PRAIRIES. 

FARGO  TO  GRAND  FORKS  AND  NECHE. 

Fargo. —  (Cass  County.)  Distance  from  St.  Paul,  242.0  miles. 
(Distance  south  of  International  Boundary  at  Neche,  159.1  miles.) 
Altitude,  900  feet.  Population,  9,589. 

The  Great  Northern  Railway  crosses  the  Red  River  of  the  North  at 
Fargo,  thence  running  down  the  Red  River  Valley  generally  at  a  distance 
of  about  ten  miles  from  the  river,  to  Grand  Forks,  and  the  International 
Boundary.  The  entire  distance  is  over  the  almost  level  plain  of  the  bot- 
tom of  Lake  Agassiz,  broken  only  by  beach  ridges,  or  shore  lines.  The 
soil  is  the  fine  silt  of  the  lake  bottom,  blackened  by  the  accumulation  of 
organic  matter.  Its  fertility  is  unexcelled  by  anything  in  the  world. 

For  fifteen  miles  out  from  Fargo  the  prairie  is  nearly  level,  and  un- 
drained.  The  plain  is  crossed  by  the  Sheyenne  River  at  Harwood,  but 
this  river  can  hardly  be  said  to  drain  the  land.  It  is  the  relic  of  a  large 
glacial  stream,  but  which  has  now  but  a  very  slight  current.  The  sta- 
tions of  Harwood  and  Argusville  are  both  lower  than  Fargo.  The  river 
would  have  to  flow  up  hill  to  discharge  its  waters  directly  into  the  Red. 

GARDNER. — Distance  from  Fargo,  20.7  miles.  (Distance  south  of 
the  International  Boundary,  138.4  miles.)  Altitude,  886  feet.  Popula- 
tion, 266. 

GRANDIN. — 27.0  miles.      (132.1  miles.)     Altitude,  891  feet. 

Hillsboro  Beach,  rising  ten  feet  from  the  prairie,  two  miles  west  of 
railroad.  With  some  difficulty  distinguished  from  the  passing  train. 

KELSO. —  (Traill  County),  33.2  miles.  (125.9  miles.)  Altitude,  897 
feet. 

North  branch  Elm  River.  Hillsboro  Beach  finely  developed  west,  a 
typical  shore-line  of  gravel  and  sand. 

HILLSBORO. — 38.9  miles.  (120.2  miles.)  Altitude,  902  feet.  Pop- 
ulation, 1,172. 

Goose  River,  north  of  the  city.  The  Hillsboro  Beach  rises  fifteen 
feet  from  the  level  prairie,  one  mile  west. 

CUMMINGS. — 46.7  miles.      (112.4  miles.)     Altitude,  904  feet 

Two  miles  south  of  Cummings  the  railroad  crosses  the  Hillsboro 
Shore-Line.  This  is  here  not  a  beach  ridge  but  an  eroded  cliff"  eight 
to  ten  feet  high.  East  of  Cummings  a  few  rods  it  is  a  well  defined  beach 
ridge  of  gravel  and  sand,  rising  ten  feet  on  the  east  side  and  falling  five 
feet  on  the  back,  or  west  side. 


THE  GREAT  NORTHERN  LINES.  327 

BUXTON. — 52.8  miles.  (106.3  miles.)  Altitude,  931  feet.  Popu- 
lation, 470. 

North  of  Cummings  the  railroad  runs  upon  the  crest  of  the  Hillsboro 
Beach  for  a  short  distance,  then  the  beach  diverges  eastward.  West  of 
Buxton  one  mile  is  the  lower  Blanchard  Beach.  This  is  the  high  ridge 
which  is  crossed  four  miles  west  of  Cummings,  on  the  stage  route  to 
Mayville. 

REYNOLDS. —  (Grand  Forks  County),  57.6  miles.  (101.5  miles.) 
Altitude,  910  feet.  Population,  389. 

The  Hillsboro  Beach  is  crossed  again  by  the  railroad  one  and  one-half 
miles  south  of  Reynolds.  The  beach  is  here  about  thirty  rods  wide,  a 
large  gravel  pit  having  been  opened  in  it.  It  is  about  eight  feet  high  on 
the  east  side,  falling  six  feet  on  the  west  side.  The  Emerado  Beach  is 
crossed  one  and  one-half  miles  north  of  Reynolds,  and  three  miles  far- 
ther north  the  upper  Ojata  Beach  is  crossed.  One  mile  north  of  Thomp- 
son the  lower  Ojata  Beach  is  crossed.  A  mile  north  of  Merrifield  is  the 
Gladstone  Beach,  which  marks  the  shore  of  the  lake  when  its  southern 
point  was  where  this  beach  crosses  the  Red  River  east  of  Buxton. 

GRAND  FORKS. — 78.2  miles.    (See  page  198.) 

SCHURMEIER. — 84.3  miles.      (74.8  miles.)     Altitude,  833  feet. 

Irregularly  ridged  surface,  showing  wave  action  at  time  of  forma- 
tion of  Burnside  Beach. 

MANVEL. — 90.7  miles.      (68.4  miles.)     Altitude,  827  feet. 

The  irregular  surface  of  the  Burnside  Beach  continues  east  of  the 
railroad  from  Schurmeier,  and  extends  through  the  west  side  of  Manvel. 

ARDOCH.— (Walsh  County),  102.4  miles.  (56.7  miles.)  Altitude, 
832  feet.  Population,  298. 

The  Burnside  Beach,  a  ridge  two  to  three  feet  high,  and  thirty  rods 
wide,  crossed  by  railroad  north  of  station. 

MINTO. — 108.8  miles.  (50.3  miles.)  Altitude,  828  feet.  Popula- 
tion, 860. 

Burnside  Shore-Line  about  a  mile  west,  but  it  is  not  easily  traced  on 
the  level  prairie.  Cross  Forest  River. 

Grafton — 117.7  miles.  (41.4  miles.)  Altitude,  834  feet.  Popu- 
lation, 2,378. 

Burnside  Beach  passes  through  east  side  of  city.  Gladstone  Beach 
about  four  miles  west,  but  neither  beach  is  well  marked.  The  region 
represents  the  almost  perfectly  level  plain  of  the  lake  bottom.  The  black 
soil  is  unexcelled  in  fertility  in  the  world. 


328  THE  STORY  OF  THE  PRAIRIES. 

ST.  THOMAS. — (Pembina  County),  131.8  miles.  (27.3  miles.)  Al- 
titude, 847  feet.  Population,  66 1. 

The  Pembina  Mountain,  or  northern  and  higher  portion  of  the  Mani- 
toba Escarpment,  rises  clearly  on  the  horizon  twenty  miles  distant. 

HAMILTON. — 144.8  miles.  (14.3  miles.)'  Altitude,  827  feet.  Pop- 
ulation, 224. 

Burnside  Beach  is  crossed  by  railroad  one  mile  south. 

BATHGATE. — 149.9  miles.  (9.2  miles.)  Altitude,  828  feet.  Popu- 
lation, 756. 

Cross  the  Tongue  River.  Burnside  Beach  about  one  mile  west,  not 
easily  recognized.  Two  or  three  low  ridges  two  to  four  feet  high,  mark- 
ing the  shore-line  of  Lake  Agassiz  during  the  Ossawa  Stage,  are  about 
two  miles  east,  and  appear  from  passing  train  as  slight  undulations  in  the 
surface.  Pembina  Mountain  rises  high  in  the  west,  distant  about  twen- 
ty-five miles. 

NECHE. — 157.7  miles.  (1.4  miles.)  Altitude,  837  feet.  Popula- 
tion, 396. 

Pembina  River  north  of  the  town.  In  a  journey  of  160  miles  from 
Fargo  the  traveler  has  seen  the  finest  agricultural  land  in  the  world. 
His  route  has  been  along  the  axial  line  of  the  Red  River  Valley.  The 
fine  sediment  of  the  lake  bottom  makes  the  soil  of  incomparable  richness. 
Nowhere  on  the  Western  Hemisphere,  if  in  the  world,  is  there  such  an 
extent  of  so  nearly  level  and  so  fertile  land,  with  so  little  waste. 

WINNIPEG. — North  of  Neche,  74.5  miles.     Altitude,  757  feet. 


WAHPETON  TO  LABIMORE  AND  HANNAH. 

Wahpeton — (Richland  County.)  Distance  from  St.  Paul,  215.4 
miles.  (Distance  south  of  International  Boundary,  228  miles.)  Alti- 
tude, 955  feet.  Population,  2,228. 

Bois  des  Sioux  River  crossed  just  above  its  junction  with  the  Red  to 
form  the  Red  River  of  the  North.  The  highest  shores  of  Lake  Agassiz 
are  twenty-eight  miles  west,  near  Wyndmere,  and  seventeen  miles  east,  in 
Minnesota.  Lake  Traverse  is  thirty-five  miles  south,  lying  in  the  trough 
of  the  southern  outlet  of  Lake  Agassiz.  The  Red  (called  also  Otter 
Tail)  and  the  Bois  des  Sioux  meet  to  form  the  Red  River  of  the  North, 
which  flows  north  along  the  axis  of  the  bed  of  Lake  Agassiz,  285  miles 
in  a  direct  line,  or  about  700  miles  following  its  winding  course,  to  Lake 


THE  GREAT  NORTHERN  LINES.  329 

Winnipeg.  At  the  time  of  the  formation  of  the  highest  shore-line  of 
Lake  Agassiz  the  water  was  about  100  feet  deep  where  the  City  of  Wah- 
peton  now  stands. 

DWIGHT. — Distance  from  Wahpeton,  6.9  miles.  (South  of  Interna- 
tional Boundary,  221.1  miles.)  Altitude,  946  feet. 

The  front  or  edge  of  the  plateau  of  the  delta  formed  by  the  Sheyenne 
River  in  Lake  Agassiz  rises  along  the  horizon  eight  miles  west. 

COLFAX. — 20.1  miles.      (206.9  miles.)     Altitude,  951  feet. 

South  two  or  three  miles  the  railroad  crosses  the  lower  McCauley- 
ville  Beach,  which  is  broken  into  dunes  of  wind-blown  sand  five  to  fifteen 
feet  high,  the  sand  having  been  washed  from  the  edge  of  the  delta,  which 
is  about  a  mile  west. 

WALCOTT. — 26.3  miles.      (201.7  miles.)     Altitude,  948  feet. 

The  delta  front  rises  in  the  near  distance  west,  so  that  the  horizon  is 
near.  The  horizon  to  the  east  is  far  out  over  the  broad  expanse  of  the 
level  lake  bottom.  Low  swelling  dunes  with  beautifully  curved  outlines 
south.  Dunes  with  ragged  crests  north.  These  are  the  wind-piled 
sands  of  the  upper  McCauleyville  Beach.  This  beach  was  formed  dur- 
ing the  lowest  stage  of  the  lake  while  it  yet  discharged  to  the  south.  The 
delta  was  formed  during  the  higher  stages  of  the  lake.  The  Campbell 
and  Tintah  Beaches  cross  the  delta  beyond  view  to  the  west,  where  their 
sands  have  been  blown  into  dunes  ten  to  thirty  feet  high. 

KINDRED. —  (Cass  County),  34.2  miles.  (193.8  miles.)  Altitude, 
932  feet.  Population,  348. 

The  lower  McCauleyville  Beach  turns  westward  between  Walcott 
and  the  Sheyenne  River.  It  is  a  large  ridge  broken  into  hills  twenty  to 
thirty  feet  high.  A  house  stands  on  the  top  of  one  of  these  hills  just 
west  of  the  railroad.  After  crossing  the  river  a  fine  view  of  the  delta 
plateau  is  obtained  from  the  level  prairie  south  of  Kindred. 

DAVENPORT. — 39.1  miles.  (188.9  miles.)  Altitude,  910  feet.  Pop- 
ulation, 245. 

Crossing  Fargo  and  Southwestern  Branch  N.  P.  R'y.  The  front  of 
the  delta  can  be  seen  from  the  west  window  as  it  extends  away  to  the 

northwest. 

• 

DURBIN. — 47.3  miles.      (180.7  miles.)     Altitude,  908  feet. 

Two  miles  north  of  Durbin  Maple  Ridge  rises  ten  feet  above  the  level 
prairie,  where  it  is  crossed  by  the  railroad.  This  is  a  beach  ridge  which 
was  built  out  from  the  shore  of  Lake  Agassiz  as  a  "spit,"  or  bar.  It  is 


330  THE  STORY  OF  THE  PRAIRIES. 

a  broad  swell  about  fifty  rods  across,  and  follows  the  course  of  Maple 
River  for  twenty  miles. 

CASSELTON. — 54.8  miles.  (173.2  miles.)  Altitude,  927  feet.  Pop- 
ulation, 1,207. 

Crossing  main  line  N.  P.  Ry.  Prairie  level  as  the  floor  of  a  house. 
An  ideal  landscape. 

ARTHUR. — 68.6  miles.      (159.4  miles.)     Altitude,  979  feet. 

The  Campbell  Beach  is  crossed  by  the  railroad  south  where  it  is  a 
ridge  rising  ten  feet  on  its  east  side.  Just  before  reaching  Arthur  the 
beach  west  of  the  track  appears  to  be  double,  one  ridge  being  higher  than 
the  other,  like  stairs.  The  lower  one  is  the  upper  McCauleyville,  the 
higher  the  Campbell.  The  crest  of  the  Campbell  Beach  lies  close  east  of 
Arthur.  This  beach  is  again  crossed  north  of  Arthur  as  it  turns  west- 
ward, the  railroad  then  running  east  of  and  near  to  the  ridge  for  about 
ten  miles.  Marshy  lagoons  occur  frequently  west  of  the  ridge. 

HUNTER. — 74.6  miles.  (153.4  miles.)  Altitude,  965  feet.  Popu- 
lation, 407. 

The  upper  McCauleyville  Beach  is  a  low  bank,  or  cliff,  east  of  Hun- 
ter. It  can  be  traced  from  the  east  window  for  about  two  miles  south, 
lying  half  a  mile  from  the  railroad.  The  Campbell  Shore-Line  is  a  well 
marked  cliff  half  a  mile  west. 

BLANCHARD. —  (Traill  County),  85.2  miles.  (142.8  miles.)  Alti- 
tude, 935  feet. 

South  of  Blanchard  a  fine  illustration  of  the  development  of  a  drain- 
age system  on  a  level  plain  is  afforded.  The  prairie  is  intersected  by  the 
north  fork  of  the  Elm  River,  and  tiny  hills,  just  like  the  big  hills  in  Penn- 
sylvania and  New  York  except  in  size,  are  separated  by  little  coulees,  or 
young  valleys.  (See  Chapter  One.) 

MAYVILLE. — 97  miles.  (131  miles.)  Altitude,  967  feet.  Popula- 
tion, i,  1 06. 

South  of  Mayville  the  rise  toward  the  western  shore  of  Lake  Agassiz 
is  clearly  seen.  The  Campbell,  Tintah,  Norcross,  and  lower  Herman 
Shore-Lines  rise  one  above  another,  the  crest  of  the  last  named  forming 
the  horizon  line.  The  heights  of  these  beaches,  as  shown  in  Figure  40, 
p&ge  85,  give  an  idea  of  the  depth  of  the  water  of  the  lake  where  the 
City  of  Mayville  now  stands,  at  the  time  when  these  beaches  were  being 
formed.  The  Campbell  Beach  passes  through  the  City  of  Portland,  two 
miles  west,  as  a  wave-cut  cliff.  The  Bruflat  Academy  stands  upon 


THE  GREAT  NORTHERN  LINES.  331 

its  crest.  North  of  Mayville  half  a  mile  the  railroad  crosses  the  upper 
McCauleyville  Beach,  which  here  has  a  nearly  northeast  course. 

HATTON. — 108.6  miles.  (119.4  miles.)  Altitude,  i, 068  feet.  Pop- 
ulation, 430. 

The  elevation  of  the  railroad  from  Mayville  to  Hatton,  a  distance  of 
less  than  twelve  miles,  rises  more  than  100  feet.  It  may  be  observed  also 
that  the  soil  becomes  more  sandy.  The  sudden  rise  in  the  elevation  and 
the  more  sandy  character  of  the  soil  are  due  to  the  fact  that  the  railroad 
here  passes  upon  the  plain  of  the  Elk  Valley  Delta.  This  delta  spreads 
over  the  lake  bottom  from  the  mouth  of  the  Elk  Valley  north  of  Larimore 
south  to  Portland,  its  southern  and  eastern  edge  thence  extending  near 
Mayville  north  and  a  little  east,  crossing  the  main  line  of  the  Great 
Northern  Railway  about  a  mile  west  of  Arvilla.  The  Norcross  Beach 
crosses  this  delta  plain  at  Hatton.  It  can  be  recognized  south  of  Hatton 
where  it  is  marked  by  small  dunes  of  wind-blown  sand.  • 

NORTH  WOOD.— ( Grand  Forks  County),  116.8  miles.  (11.2  miles.) 
Altitude,  1,1 01  feet.  Population,  697. 

From  Hatton  north  is  a  beautiful  prairie^  the  top  of  the  delta  being 
here  but  slightly  undulating.  The  highland  of  the  Manitoba  Escarp- 
ment, the  southern  extension  of  the  Pembina  Mountain,  rises  clearly  in 
view  in  the  west.  The  highest,  or  Herman,  shore-line  of  Lake  Agassiz 
lies  at  the  foot  of  this  long  hill. 

LARIMORE. — 129.5  miles.  (98.5  miles.)  Altitude,  1,138  feet. 
Population,  1,235.  (See  page  199-) 

McCANNA.— 137.7  miles.      (90.3  miles.)     Altitude,  1,145  feet- 

The  broad  level  plain  is  the  mouth  of  the  Elk  Valley.  The  highland 
west  is  the  Manitoba  Escarpment.  North  four  miles  and  half  a  mile  east 
of  the  railroad,  rises  the  first  of  the  series  of  hills  locally  known  as  'The 
Ridge."  These  hills  were  islands  in  Lake  Agassiz.  The  Ridge  formed 
the  eastern  side,  and  the  Manitoba  Escarpment  the  western  side,  of  the 
Elk  Valley.  It  was  the  Glacial  Elk  River,  which  once  flowed  in  this 
broad  valley,  which  formed  the  delta  south  of  Larimore.  North  of  this 
first  island  the  railroad  crosses  a  high  beach  ridge  which  extends  between 
the  first  and  second  islands.  The  second  island  rises  as  a  large  hill  west 
of  the  railroad  after  crossing  the  beach  ridge. 

ORR. — 143.0  miles.      (85.0  miles.)     Altitude,  1,103  feet. 

Fine  view  of  the  great  plain  of  the  bottom  of  Lake  Agassiz,  from 
east  window,  south  of  Orr.  A  few  rods  south  of  the  station  the  railroad 


,332  THE  STORY  OF  THE  PRAIRIES. 

crosses  the  Norcross  Beach,  which  is  here  a  well  defined  ridge  of  gravel 
and  sand. 

INKSTER. — 148.5  miles.  (79.5  miles.)  Altitude,  1,041  feet.  Pop- 
ulation, 376. 

Two  miles  north  of  Orr  the  railroad  crosses  the  Tintah  Beach,  which 
is  well  marked.  West  of  the  railroad  it  is  double,  the  upper  crest  being 
two  to  five  feet  higher  than  the  lower.  Inkster  stands  upon  the  flat  top 
of  the  Campbell  Beach,  which  is  here  a  wave-cut  cliff,  or  bank,  fifteen  to 
twenty-five  feet  high.  Half  a  mile  east,  on  the  level  prairie,  is  the  Mc~ 
Cauleyville  Beach,  a  gravelly  and  sandy  ridge.  The  railroad  crosses  the 
latter  north  of  Inkster  near  the  crossing  of  Forest  River,  where  it  is  a 
conspicuous  ridge,  its  front  rising  eight  feet  from  the  prairie,  and  falling 
five  feet  on  the  west. 

CON  WAY. —  (Walsh  County),  154.5  miles.  (73.5  miles.)  Altitude. 
993  feet.  Population,  216. 

From  the  crossing  of  Forest  River  north  to  Conway  the  McCauley- 
ville  Beach  lies  a  few  rods  west  of  the  railroad.  A  half  mile  west  and 
parallel  with  it  is  the  Campbell  Beach.  The  first  of  'The  Mountains"- 
the  name  locally  applied  to  the  large  hills  which  are  the  northern  continu- 
ation of  "The  Ridge" — rises  high  two  and  one-half  miles  west  of  Con- 
way  as  a  large  long  hill. 

PISEK.— 160.0  miles.  (68.0  miles.)  Altitude,  1,006  feet.  Popu- 
lation, 132. 

The  wide  southern  end  of  the  second  "Mountain"  rises  three  miles 
west.  The  crest  of  this  "mountain"  is  200  to  225  feet  higher  than  the 
surrounding  prairie,  and  seventy-five  to  one  hundred  feet  higher  than  the 
highest  point  reached  by  the  waters  of  Lake  Agassiz. 

PARK  RIVER. — 166.1  miles.  (61.9  miles.)  Altitude,  1,003  ^eet- 
Population,  1,088. 

From  two  miles  south  of  Pisek  the  railroad  runs  on  the  natural  grade 
of  the  McCauleyville  Beach.  The  Campbell  Beach  lies  half  a  mile  west, 
and  is  a  massive  beach  rising  twenty  to  thirty-five  feet.  The  Mountain 
is  hidden  from  view  by  the  high  crest  of  this  beach.  After  crossing 
Park  River  the  top  of  the  Mountain  is  seen  above  the  crest  of  the  beach. 
About  a  mile  north  the  railroad  crosses  the  Campbell  Beach  by  a  deep 
cut.  The  prairie  surface  beyond  is  marked  by  hummocks,  the  irregular 
Tintah  and  Norcross  Beaches,  broken  by  the  action  of  the  waves  beating 
upon  the  base  of  the  Mountain,  which  now  rises  high  to  the  west. 


THE  GREAT  NORTHERN  LINES.  333 

EDINBURG. — 175.5  miles.  (52-5  miles.)  Altitude,  1,194  feet.  Pop- 
ulation, 286. 

Edinburg  stands  at  the  north  end  of  the  Mountain.  This  "Moun- 
tain." which  is  a  part  of  the  great  ridge  which  forms  the  eastern  side 
of  Elk  Valley  (called  Golden  Valley,  or  Pleasant  Valley,  in  northern 
portion)  should  be  clearly  distinguished  from  the  Pembina  Mountain, 
which  is  a  part  of  the  Manitoba  Escarpment,  which  formed  the  western 
shore  of  Lake  Agassiz.  "The  Ridge"  and  "The  Mountains"  on  the  east 
side  of  Elk  and  Golden  Valleys,  are  drift  hills  (moraines).  The  Mani- 
toba Escarpment  is  a  hill  of  the  Cretaceous  rocks.  (See  Seventh  Chap- 
ter, page  69. )  The  higher  part  of  the  Manitoba  Escarpment,  north  from 
about  where  the  railroad  passes  upon  it,  is  called  Pembina  Mountain. 

MILTON. —  (Cavalier  County),  1 88.1  miles.  (39.9  miles.)  Altitude, 
1,591  feet.  Population,  384. 

In  the  distance  from  Edinburg  to  Milton,  a  little  more  than  twelve 
miles,  the  railroad  rises  397  feet,  the  grade  being  forty-two  feet  to  the 
mile  for  seven  or  eight  miles.  Here  are  many  boulders  of  granite,  and 
gravel  and  sand,  and  the  irregular  ridges  and  rounded  hills  which  always 
indicate  a  terminal  moraine.  This  is  one  of  the  ranges  of  the  Itasca,  or 
Tenth,  Moraine.  Boulders  are  especially  abundant  about  Union.  Deep 
cuts  along  the  railroad  show  sections  of  drift  hills,  often  with  stratified 
sand,  some  of  the  excavations  reaching  into  the  shales  of  the  bed-rock. 
Deep,  jagged  sided  coulees,  and  forests  of  poplar  trees,  lend  a  pic- 
turesque grandeur  to  the  scene.  Magnificent  panoramic  views  of  the 
level  plain  of  the  valley  bottom  of  Lake  Agassiz  are  obtained  at  different 
points  along  the  line.  A  fine  example  of  a  "young  valley"  occurs  west 
of  Milton, — one  of  the  head  streams  of  Park  River.  Its  course  can  be 
followed  for  several  miles  (better  traced  when  traveling  east)  from  west 
of  Milton,  where  it  has  its  "head,"  growing  deeper  and  wider  down  its 
course  south  and  east,  many  small  "tributaries"  entering  it. 

OSNABROCK. — 193.7  miles.  (34.3  miles.)  Altitude,  1,625  feet. 
Population,  228. 

Fine  undulating  prairie,  marked  by  occasional  low  morainic  hills. 

EASBY. — 199.2  miles.      (28.8  miles.)     Altitude,  1,652  feet. 

A  small  but  noticeable  range  of  morainic  hills  extends  across  the  line 
of  the  railroad  in  a  northwest  by  north  direction. 

Langdon. — 205.4  miles.  (22.6  miles.)  Altitude,  1,615  feet  Pop- 
ulation, i,  1 1 8. 

Range  of  morainic  hills  east  half  a  mile.     Rolling  prairie  landscape, 


334  THE  STORY  OF  THE  PRAIRIES. 

fine  farming  lands.  Several  low,  gently  rising  moraines,  belonging  to 
the  Itasca  Moraine,  lie  in  nearly  parallel  courses  a  few  miles  apart. 

HANNAH. — 226.5  miles.  (1.5  miles.)  Altitude,  1,568  feet.  Pop- 
ulation, 596. 

Terminus  of  railroad.  The  vast  plain  comprising  the  top  of  Pem- 
bina  Mountain  is  crossed  by  several  small  ranges  of  the  Itasca  Moraine. 
These  diverge  from  the  line  of  the  railroad  going  north  and  approach  it 
going  south,  from  the  right  hand. 


CHAPTER  THE  TWENTY-NINTH. 

GEOLOGY  FROM  A  CAR  WINDOW— THE  NORTHERN  PACIFIC  LINES. 

y  ; . 

Fargo — (Cass  County.)  Distance  from  St.  Paul,  251.5  miles. 
(Distance  from  Montana  Line,  376.2  miles.)  Altitude,  902  feet.  Popu- 
lation, 9,589. 

Fargo  is  situated  upon  the  axis  of  the  Red  River  Valley,  surrounded 
by  the  almost  perfectly  level  prairie  of  the  bottom  of  Lake  Agassiz,  the 
great  wheat  belt  of  the  Northwest  and  the  world.  The  Northern  Pacific 
Railway  runs  nearly  due  west  across  the  State.  For  more  than  forty 
miles  across  the  level  plain  of  the  lake  bottom  the  track  is  without  a 
curve,  said  to  be  the  longest  stretch  of  straight  track  in  the  world. 

MAPLETON. — Distance  from  Fargo,  12.5  miles.  (363.7  miles.) 
Altitude,  905  feet.  Population,  322. 

Prairie  rises  imperceptibly  toward  the  west.  At  Greene,  two  miles 
west,  the  railroad  crosses  "Maple  Ridge,"  which  rises  ten  feet  from  the 
prairie  to  the  east.  This  was  an  off-shore  bar  known  as  a  "spit,"  built 
at  the  time  of  the  Blanchard  and  Hillsboro  stages  of  Lake  Agassiz. 

CASSELTON. — 20.0  miles.  (356.2  miles.)  Altitude,  931  feet.  Popu- 
lation, 1,207. 

Crossing  Breckenridge  Division  Great  Northern  Railway.  Broad, 
level,  fertile  prairie;  the  finest  wheat  land  in  the  world. 

WHEATLAND. — 25.6  miles.     (350.6  miles.)     Altitude,  992  feet. 

Level  prairie  continues  west  of  Casselton,  till  at  Wheatland  it  rises 
suddenly  fifteen  feet  onto  a  conspicuous  gravelly  ridge  sixty  rods  wide, 
the  Campbell  Beach. 

MAGNOLIA. — 29.7  miles.     (346.5  miles.)     Altitude,  1,078  feet. 

The  watertank  stands  upon  the  Herman  Beach,  the  highest  shore- 
line of  Lake  Agassiz,  and  the  western  limit  of  the  Red  River  Valley. 
The  Tintah  and  Norcross  Beaches  were  crossed  between  this  point  and 
Wheatland.  Beach  sand  and  gravel  are  taken  from  an  extensive  pit 
which  has  been  opened  in  the  Herman  Beach. 

335 


336  THE   STORY   OF   THE   PRAIRIES. 

BUFFALO. — 35.2  miles.  (341.0  miles.)  Altitude,  1,204  feet.  Popu- 
lation, 213. 

Buffalo  is  212  feet  higher  than  Wheatland,  less  than  ten  miles  east, 
and  126  feet  higher  than  Magnolia,  five  and  one-half  miles  east,  at  the 
highest  shore-line  of  Lake  Agassiz.  This  is  the  Manitoba  Escarpment, 
the  continuation  -of  the  Pembina  Mountain  highland,  which  formed  the 
western  side  of  the  pre-glacial  Red  River  Valley.  (See  Seventh  Chap- 
ter. )  The  traveler  can  easily  distinguish  the  heavy  grade  as  the  engine 
toils  westward,  or  rolls  with  easy  speed  toward  the  east.  At  Buffalo  a 
distinct  range  of  low  hills  is  crossed,  the  Fergus  Falls,  or  Eighth, 
Moraine.  The  moraine  makes  a  loop  south  of  the  railroad,  being  crossed 
again  fifteen  miles  west  near  Alta. 

TOWER  CITY. — 41.0  miles.  (335-2  miles.)  Altitude,  1,172  feet. 
Population,  468. 

Scattered  morainic  "knobs"  give  a  varied  aspect  to  the  prairie,  out- 
lying hills  from  the  moraine  just  crossed. 

ORISKA! — ,( Barnes  County),  46.5  miles.  (329.7  miles.)  Altitude, 
1,269  feet- 

One  of  the  ranges  of  the  Fergus  Falls  Moraine  is  well  shown  east 
of  Oriska  about  two  miles.  North  of  Oriska  are  seen  broad,  low  hills 
differing  in  appearance  from  the  "morainic"  hills.  These  are  "pre- 
glacial"  hills,  that  is,  they  were  hills  before  the  Ice  Invasion,  and  while 
they  were  passed  over  by  the  ice,  yet  were  not  leveled  down  entirely.  f. 
They  are  therefore  "veneered  hills,"  being  covered  with  a  mantle  of  drift. 

ALTA. — 51.3  miles.     (324.9  miles.)     Altitude,  1,430  feet. 

More  hills  of  the  Fergus  Falls  Moraine  between  Oriska  and  Alta. 
The  elevation  at  Alta  is  161  feet  higher  than  at  Oriska,  five  miles  east. 
This  rapid  rise  means  that  here  was  a  hillside  on  the  old,  or  pre-glacial, 
landscape.  Broad  hills  with  smooth  surfaces  north  are  veneered  hills. 
Pilot  Mound,  seven  or  eight  miles  north  of  Alta,  is  such  a  veneered 
hill. 

Valley  City — 57.0  miles.  (319.2  miles.)  Altitude,  1,221  feet. 
Population,  2,446. 

Crossing  main  line  of  Soo  Railway.  The  railroad  descends  209  feet 
from  Alta  to  the  bottom  of  the  Sheyenne  Valley,  rising  again  204  feet 
to  Berea,  five  miles  west.  At  the  edge  of  the  valley  east  of  the  city  a 
fragment  of  the  prairie  has  been  cut  around  by  coulees  so  as  to  form  a 
flat-topped  hill,  or  "butte."  This  is  capped  with  drift  to  a  depth  of  ten 
or  twelve  feet.  The  line  of  separation  between  the  drift  and  the  under- 


THE  NORTHERN  PACIFIC  LINES.  337 

lying  Cretaceous  shales  can  be  traced  by  the  difference  in  the  vegetation 
above  and  below  the  line.  A  similar  line  can  be  followed  along  the  sides 
of  the  coulee  down  which  the  railroad  descends  to  the  valley  bottom  from 
the  east,  and  also  along  the  sides  of  the  valley  of  the  Sheyenne.  Large 
.  and  small  boulders  are  strewn  upon  the  top  and  sides  of  the  "butte,"  and 
also  along  the  coulee.  Outcroppings  of  the  blue  shale  can  be  seen  along 
the  sides  of  the  coulee,  and  in  places  in  the  steep  sides  of  the  Sheyenne 
Valley. 

The  Sheyenne  Valley  has  a  most  interesting  history.  Here  once 
rolled  a  mighty  river,  many  times  larger  than  the  present  small  stream 
which  occupies  the  great  valley,  because  kept  at  flood  by  the  waters  from 
the  great  melting  Ice-Sheet,  during  the  closing  stages  of  the  Glacial 
Period.  This  glacial  river  carved  its  broad  channel  deeply  into  the 
Cretaceous  shales  which  underlie  the  drift,  and  bore  the  materials  thus 
eroded,  together  with  sand  and  finer  rock-powder  from  the  melting  ice, 
into  Lake  Agassiz,  and  there  built  up  the  great  delta  which  bears  its 
name.  (See  Ninth  Chapter.) 

SANBORN. — 68.0  miles.  (308.2  miles.)  Altitude,  1,445  feet.  Popu- 
lation, 259. 

The  hills  of  the  Dovre,  or  Seventh,  Moraine  lie  west  of  the  Sheyenne 
River,  and  cap  the  hills  which  border  the  coulee  up  which  the  railroad  rises 
to  the  prairie  from  Valley  City.  Once  out  upon  the  prairie  numerous 
steep,  rounded  knobs  are  noticed.  South  of  the  railroad  the  hills  of  the 
Waconia,  or  Sixth,  Moraine  rise  from  fifty  to  seventy-five  feet  above 
the  prairie.  This  moraine  continues  south  of  the  railroad  and  nearly 
parallel  with  it  for  several  miles.  A  long  lake  extends  south  from  Hobart, 
and  several  lakes,  one  of  which  is  crossed  by  the  railroad  a  mile 
east  of  Sanborn,  represent  ancient  watercourses,  probably  pre-glacial 
valleys,  which  were  partially  filled  with  drift. 

ECKELSON. — 74.4  miles.     (301.8  miles.)     Altitude,  1,464  feet. 

The  railroad  crosses  Lake  Eckelson,  which  also  lies  in  an  old  water- 
way. The  hills  surrounding  the  lake  rise  twenty-five  to  forty  feet.  Wave- 
worn  beaches  border  the  lake,  and  boulders  are  perched  upon  the  shores, 
shoved  up  by  the  action  of  ice  during  winters.  The  Waconia  Moraine  is 
•crossed  by  the  railroad  just  west  of  Eckelson. 

URBANA. — 78.2  miles.     (298.0  miles.)     Altitude,  1,471  feet. 

Between  Eckelson  and  Urbana  the  railroad  crosses  another  ancient 
waterway  a  fourth  to  a  half  mile  in  width,  with  hills  rising  forty  feet  on 
each  side.  This  old  valley  is  occupied  by  a  lake  north  of  the  track,  and 


338  THE    STORY   OF   THE    PRAIRIES. 

by  a  slough  south.  More  small  lakes  lie  in  the  valley  to  the  south  and 
west. 

SPIRITWOOD. —  (Stutsman  County.)  81.0  miles.  (295.2  miles.) 
Altitude,  1,478  feet. 

West  of  Spiritwood  the  railroad  crosses  a  broad  and  deep  valley 
having  steep  sides  and  a  level  bottom,  extensive  hay-meadows  occupying 
the  flat  bottom.  This  is  the  valley  in  which  lies  the  Spiritwood  Chain  of 
Lakes.  These  lakes  lie  along  a  course  from  five  or  six  miles  north  of 
the  railroad  fifteen  miles  or  more  to  the  northwest.  This  also  is  an 
ancient  drainage  channel.  East  of  Spiritwood  station  the  low  rolling 
hills  are  those  of  the  Elysian,  or  Fifth,  Moraine.  West  of  the  station 
are  similar  hills  of  the  Kiester,  or  Fourth,  Moraine. 

Jamestown — 92.0  miles.  (284.2  miles.)  Altitude,  1,397  ^eet-  P°P~ 
ulation,  2,853. 

The  buildings  of  the  North  Dakota  Asylum  for  the  Insane  stand  upon 
the  west  bank  of  the  James  River,  seen  from  south  window.  A  fine  view 
of  the  deep  James  Valley,  its  sides  serrated  with  coulees,  is  afforded 
as  the  approach  is  made  to  the  city.  The  Valley  of  the  James  is  not  as 
deep  as  that  of  the  Sheyenne,  being  from  seventy-five  to  125  feet  deep, 
cut  in  the  drift  through  most  of  its  course,  but  in  places  having  its  bed 
in  the  Cretaceous  rocks  which  underlie  the  drift.  Like  the  Sheyenne 
Valley,  it  is  a  large  channel  eroded  by  the  flood-waters  from  the  melting 
Ice-Sheet.  From  Bloom,  five  miles  east  of  Jamestown,  the  highest  point 
between  the  James  and  Sheyenne  Valleys,  the  railroad  descends  101  feet 
to  Jamestown.  West  the  grade  rises  132  feet  in  five  miles,  to  the  prairie. 
The  coulee  up  which  the  railroad  passes  to  the  prairie  to  the  west  fur- 
nishes a  fine  illustration  of  the  development  of  a  river  system.  The 
coulee,  itself  a' "young"  valley,  has  its  sides  serrated  with  many  smaller 
coulees,  still  "younger"  tributaries.  The  prairie  bordering  the  Valley  is 
thus  being  cut  up  into  hills. 


DEVILS  LAKE  BRANCH. 

JAMESTOWN  NORTHWARD. — The  railroad  follows  the  valley  of  the 
Pipe  Stem  River,  and  a  coulee  which  enters  this,  to  the  general  level  of 
the  prairie  at  Parkhurst,  six  miles  from  Jamestown. 

The  great  plateau,  the  Coteau  du  Missouri,  rises  in  the  west  six  to 
ten  miles  distant,  the  railroad  running  at  about  this  distance  from  the 
steep  slope  of  its  front  for  twenty-five  miles  to  the  northern  boundary 


THE  NORTHERN  PACIFIC  LINES.  339 

of  Stutsman  County.  At  times  the  horizon  line  is  rendered  broken  and 
irregular  along  the  top  of  the  plateau  by  the  morainic  knobs  and  ridges 
which  lie  upon  it.  Deep  coukes  also  intersect  the  face  of  the  sloping 
front  of  the  great  highland.  The  prairie  is  a  fine  level  expanse  such  as 
is  common  in  the  broad  tracts  between  moraines.  This  gently  undulating- 
tract  continues  northward  for  forty  miles,  to  Carrington. 

MELVILLE. —  (Foster  County.)  33.4  miles  north  from  Jamestown. 
Altitude,  1,602  feet. 

From  this  point  the  railroad  diverges  from  its  course  parallel  with 
the  front  of  the  great  plateau.  Hawk's  Nest,  a  large  outlying  hill  belong- 
ing to  the  plateau,  lifts  its  Iplue  and  hazy  head  on  the  horizon  twelve  miles 
west. 

Carrington. — 42.4  miles.  Altitude,  1,579  feet-  Population,  1,150. 
(See  p.  236.) 

New  Rockford — (Eddy  County.)  58.5  miles.  Altitude,  1,529  feet. 
Population,  698. 

Cross  the  James  River,  here  a  small  stream  with  sluggish  current. 
A  splendid  expanse  of  gently  undulating  prairie  extends  fifteen  to  twenty 
miles  both  east  and  west.  About  two  miles  north  the  railroad  passes 
upon  a  tract  of  morainic  hills.  Between  this  point  and  Minnewa'ukan, 
twenty-five  miles  north,  the  railroad  crosses  several  morainic  belts,  which 
represent  the  Kiester,  Elysian,  Waconia,  Dovre,  Fergus  Falls,  and  Leaf 
Hills  Moraines.  Between  the  broad  belts  of  hills  are  tracts  of  nearly  level 
prairie  varying  from  two  to  seven  miles  in  width. 

SHEYENNE. — 69.6  miles.     Altitude,  1,470  feet. 

A  broad  inter-morainic  belt,  traversed  by  the  Sheyenne  River.  A 
fine  illustration  of  river  terraces  is  observed  west  of  the  railroad  bridge, 
there  being  two  distinct  terraces,  or  "benches,"  one  higher  than  the  other. 
These  are  best  seen  from  the  west  window,  or  from  the  rear  platform. 

OBERON. —  (Benson  County.)  78.3  miles.  Altitude,  1,559  ^ee^- 
Population,  217. 

Oberon  lies  at  the  eastern  end  of  the  Antelope  Valley,  a  fertile  inter- 
morainic  tract  of  gently  undulating  prairie,  from  five  to  six  miles  wide, 
lying  between  ranges  of  hills  from  one  to  three  miles  wide.  No  stream 
occupies  this  valley,  nor  is  it  a  glacial  drainage  course.  It  is  a  nearly 
level  belt  of  prairie  between  moraines, — an  inter-morainic  tract.  Two 
miles  north  the  railroad  crosses  a  morainic  range  about  two  miles  in 
width,  then  passes  upon  an  inter-morainic  tract,  on  which  Lallie,  or  Fort 


340  THE    STORY    OF   THE    PRAIRIES. 

Totten  Station,  stands.    This  prairie  is  about  eight  miles  long  and  two 
miles  wide,  and  entirely  surrounded  by  ranges  of  morainic  hills. 

Minnewaukan. — 89.1  miles.     Altitude,  1,461  feet.     Population,  432. 

One  and  one-half  miles  north  of  Lallie  the  railroad  passes  amongst 
the  hills,  which  continue  for  six  miles,  to  Minnewaukan,  except  for  two 
small  inter-morainic  areas  which  are  nearly  level.  Minnewaukan  stands 
on  the  western  shore  of  Devils  Lake,  at  the  northern  edge  of  the  great 
morainic  region  just  crossed.  A  broad  expanse  of  prairie  lies  north. 

LEEDS. — 107.3  miles-     Altitude,  1,516  feet.     Population,  349. 

The  railroad  passes  near  to  the  eastern  end  of  Big  Butte,  or  Mauvais 
Butte,  and  along  the  west  shore  of  Lake  Ibsent  Big  Butte  is  a  large  hill 
which  belongs  in  the  same  series  of  hills  as  Devils  Heart  and  Sully's 
Hill,  south  of  Devils  Lake,  large  pre-glacial  hills  which  are  covered  with 
a  mantle  of  drift,  but  are  not  themselves  "drift  hills'."  The  western  and 
higher  end  of  the  Big  Butte  is  crossed  by  well  marked  morainic  ridges, 
with  many  large  boulders. 

*********** 

ELDRIDGE. — 99.0  miles.     (227.2  miles.)     Altitude,  1,542  feet. 

After  rising  from  the  Valley  of  the  James  River,  the  great  western 
plateau,  the  Coteau  du  Missouri,  forms  the  blue  and  hazy  horizon  west. 
The  Antelope,  or  Third,  Moraine  is  crossed  just  west  of  E.,  the  moraine 
lying  along  the  foot  of  the  great  plateau.  The  engine  will  be  noticed  to 
toil  heavily  now,  as  the  ascent  is  made  onto  the  plateau.  From  three 
miles  west  of  Eldridge  the  grade  rises  277  feet  in  a  distance  of  six  miles 
to  Windsor. 

WINDSOR. — 108.0  miles.     (268.2  miles.)     Altitude,  1,839  ^eet- 

The  slope  of  the  plateau  front  is  marked  by  many  coulees,  small  lakes 
and  marsh  hay-meadows  being  numerous  among  the  hills  of  the  Antelope 
Moraine.  The  eastern  edge  of  the  plateau  marks  the  "divide"  between 
the  James  Valley  and  Missouri  "Slope."  The  landscape  is  now  a  high 
rolling  prairie,  with  hills  rising  fifteen  to  forty  feet,  and  sometimes 
seventy-five  to  100  feet.  This  is  a  splendid  grazing  country.  Ranche 
buildings,  and  fine  herds  of  cattle,  horses  and  sheep  may  be  seen  upon 
the  hillsides  and  prairies.  What  have  been  glacial  lake  bottoms  are  now 
the  best  of  hay-meadows.  Some  of  these  flat  bottoms  show  well  defined 
wave-worn  beaches  around  their  margins,  now  nicely  grassed  over. 
Some  of  these  lakes  probably  represent  the  bottoms  of  glacial  drainage 
channels. 


THE  NORTHERN  PACIFIC  LINES.  341 

MEDINA. — 120.5  miles.     (255.7  miles.)     Altitude,  1,794  feet. 

Occasional  high  morainic  hills,  but  the  landscape  generally  is  the 
"swell-and-sag"  topography  of  glacial  regions.  Large  granite  boulders 
are  frequent.  Fine  hay  sloughs  and  alkaline  lakes  occupy  low  places. 
To  the  west  the  railroad  crosses  a  channel  in  which  lies  a  long  lake,  well 
grown  with  rushes,  a  long  morainic  hill  of  white  sand  lying  in  this  lake. 
This  is  probably  a  drainage  channel  by  which  water  from  the  melting  ice- 
sheet  escaped  to  the  Missouri  River. 

CRYSTAL  SPRINGS. —  (Kidder  County.)  128.8  miles.  (248.2  miles.) 
Altitude,  1,796  feet. 

The  railroad  passes  amongst  the  hills  of  the  Gary,  or  Second,  Moraine, 
to  the  west.  The  main  range  lies  south,  but  high  hills  also  occur  north. 
Hills  rise  to  a  height  of  125  feet  above  prairie.  The  track  runs  for 
several  miles  along  the  course  of  an  old  glacial  channel  now  occupied  by 
a  long  irregular  lake,  and  low,  marshy  lands. 

TAPPEN. — 136.7  miles.     (239.5  miles.)     Altitude,  1,765  feet. 

Large  hills  of  the  Gary  Moraine  both  north  and  south  of  railroad. 
West  of  Tappen  another  broad  valley  is  crossed,  having  sloping  sides 
and  an  extensive  hay-meadow  on  its  bottom, — another  glacial  drainage 
channel. 

DAWSON. — 142.0  miles.     (234.2  miles.)     Altitude,  1,746  feet. 

Fine  level  prairie  about  the  town.  South  are  the  high  hills  of  the 
Altamont,  or  First,  Moraine.  High  hills  of  this  moraine  are  also  seen 
north  in  distance.  West  the  railroad  makes  a  long  cut  through  a  range 
of  hills  belonging  to  this  moraine,  then  suddenly  comes  into  a  broad 
shallow  glacial  channel,  its  bottom  marked  by  lakes  and  hay  marshes. 
This  is  Long  Lake  Valley,  an  old  drainage  course  which  extends  south- 
west to  Long  Lake,  and- the  Missouri  River. 

Steele — 150.0  miles.  (226.2  miles.)  Altitude,  1,856  feet.  Popu- 
lation, 185. 

Fine  level  tract  about  Steele.  Hills  of  the  Altamont  Moraine  south. 
A  small  ridge  crossed  west.  High  rugged  hills  north.  West  of  Steele 
a  few  miles  a  grassy  lake  bottom,  probably  a  part  of  the  Long  Lake 
glacial  drainage  system.  That  this  has  been  the  place  of  a  larger  sheet 
of  water  is  shown  by  the  boulders  perched  high  on  its  shore. 

DRISCOLL. —  (Burleigh  County.)  161.0  miles.  (215.2  miles.)  Alti- 
tude, 1,873  feet- 

Hills  of  Altamont  Moraine  south  of  railroad  approaching  Driscoll. 
West  the  train  glides  swiftly  down  to  a  broad,  level,  marshy  meadow.  In 


342  THE    STORY    OF   THE    PRAIRIES. 

this  valley  lies  a  chain  of  lakes  representing  a  large  channel  of  glacial 
drainage  which  opens  southwest  into  the  valley  of  Apple  Creek. 

STERLING. — 169.6  miles.     (206.6  miles.)     Altitude,  1,812  feet. 

A  deep  cut  is  here  made  through  the  high  crest  of  a  ridge  of  the 
Altamont  Moraine,  the  crest  being  eighty-two  feet  above  the  track,  and 
the  highest  hill  crossed  by  the  railroad  between  Fargo  and  Bismarck. 
Many  boulders,  some  of  immense  size,  lie  along  the  surface.  Some  of 
these  knobs  rise  200  feet  above  the  prairie.  Butte-like  hills  capped  with 
the  Fox  Hills  Sandstone  can  be  seen  in  the  distance.  These  are  hills  of 
erosion,  and  not  drift  hills.  The  last  ridge  of  morainic  hills,  westward, 
has  now  been  passed.  At  McKenzie  a  fine  level  hay-meadow  is  crossed, 
which  belongs  to  the  Apple  Creek  Valley  glacial  drainage  system,  lead- 
ing to  the  Missouri  River. 

BURLEIGH. — 180.0  miles.     (196.2  miles.)     Altitude,  1,722  feet. 

Burleigh  stands  on  a  terrace  plateau,  the  old  flood-plain  of  the  large 
glacial  river  in  the  valley  of  which  now  sluggishly  meanders  the  small 
Apple  Creek.  About  a  mile  west  of  Burleigh  the  "bottom"  of  the  valley 
is  crossed,  about  seventy-five  feet  below  the  old  flood-plain  on  which 
Burleigh  stands. 

BISMARCK. — 192.7  miles.     (183.5  miles.)     Altitude,  1,670  feet. 
Population,  3,319. 

The  State  Penitentiary  stands  upon  what  appears  to  be  a  terrace 
about  fifteen  feet  above  the  bottom  of  the  creek  to  the  east,  and  sixty 
feet  lower  than  the  terrace  on  which  Burleigh  stands.  The  depot  at 
Bismarck  stands  upon  another  terrace-like  plateau  ten  or  twelve  feet 
higher  than  that  at  the  Penitentiary,  and  about  two  miles  west  the  eleva- 
tion is  about  the  same  as  that  at  Burleigh. 

The  Missouri  River  is  a  majestic  stream.  Its  broad  sandy  bottom 
spreads  out  in  the  distance  south.  Along  its  banks  the  Cretaceous  rocks 
which  underlie  the  drift  are  exposed  in  many  places.  A  fine  view  of  a 
section  of  these  rocks  is  obtained  at  the  east  end  of  the  railroad  bridge 
which  spans  the  river.  The  strata  of  shale  extend  up  nearly  to  the  top 
of  the  high  bank,  being  capped  writh  a  thin  mantle  of  drift.  This  shows 
that  the  broad  valley  east  of  Bismarck  is  really  a  valley  cut  in  the  under- 
lying rocks,  the  drift  merely  forming  a  surface  covering.  North  and 
east  of  Bismarck,  along  the  line  of  the  Bismarck,  Washburn,  and  Great 
Falls  Railway,  many  fine  examples  of  butte-like  hills  may  be  seen,  their 
flat  tops  capped  with  the  Fox  Hills  Sandstone.*  The  extensive  coal  mines 

*J.  E.  Todd. 


THE  NORTHERN  PACIFIC  LINES.  343 

at  WiltOn,  and  other  points  north,  are  in  a  higher  series  of  rocks  than 
the  Fox  Hills  formation.  The  coal  formation  is  the  Laramie.  This 
means  that  the  shelves  of  sandstone  rock  which  cap  the  hills  would  be 
found  deep  below  the  coal  to  the  north.  (See  Eighteenth  Chapter.) 

Mandan — (Morton  County.)  199.5  miles.  (176.7  miles.)  Alti- 
tude, 1,644  feet-  Population,  1,658. 

Mandan  is  located  on  the  broad  plain  at  the  mouth  of  the  valley  of 
the  Heart  River,  near  where  that  stream  enters  the  Missouri.  The  city 
is  picturesquely  located  among  the  hills,  which  have  been  formed  by  the 
deep  cutting  of  the  Heart  River  and  its  tributaries.  The  hills  rise 
abruptly  300  to  400  feet  above  the  bottom  of  the  valley.  Ascending  the 
Heart  Valley,  shale  and  sandstone  outcroppings  occur  in  the  sides  of  the 
drift-capped  hills.  Numerous  drift  boulders  lie  along  the  bottoms  and 
sides  of  the  coulees. 

SWEET  BRIAR. — 214.8  miles.     (161.4  miles.)     Altitude,  1,799  ^eet- 

The  railroad  passes  up  Sweet  Briar  Creek  from  the  valley  of  the 
Heart  River.  A  shelf  of  sandstone  outcrops  along  the  north  side  of  the 
valley.  Where  the  side  of  the  valley  is  grown  over  with  grass  a  mark 
on  the  hillside  shows  the  edge  of  the  sandstone  shelf.  Going  up  the 
valley  the  sandstone  layer  approaches  the  bottom,  and  other  layers  of 
rock  are  above.  The  layers  do  not  become  lower,  but  the  bottom  of  the 
valley  rises.  Farther  west  many  capped  buttes  are  observed,  and  the 
layer  of  hard  sandstone  which  caps  these  becomes  lower  in  relation  to 
the  surface,  and  finally  disappears  beneath  the  surface. 

JUDSON. — 220.5  miles.     (155.7  miles.)     Altitude,  1,948  feet. 

The  railroad  still  follows  the  branching  coulee,  not  yet  having  reached 
the  general  prairie  surface.  Many  boulders  lie  upon  the  surface,  and 
crags  of  sandstone  project  from  the  hills. 

NEW  SALEM. — 227.0  miles.  (149.2  miles.)  Altitude,  2,160  feet. 
Population,  229. 

Here  the  high  prairie  is  reached.  The  highest  peak,  which  stands  far 
above  the  surrounding  landscape,  shows  outcropping  horizontal  layers 
of  sandstone.  Some  idea  of  the  amount  of  earth  which  has  been  carried 
away  by  erosion  can  be  gained  from  this,  for  the  projecting  edges  of  this 
high  peak  are  part  of  the  horizontal  layers  which  once  extended  over 
the  whole  landscape,  and  have  been  all  carried  away  except  this.  Some 
of  this  rock  is  now  the  sand  along  the  valley  of  the  Missouri  River,  and 
some  has  been  carried  far  down  toward  the  Gulf  of  Mexico,  and  some 
may  be  resting  on  its  bottom.  Occasional  large  boulders  lie  upon  the 


344  THE    STORY    OF   THE    PRAIRIES. 

surface,  but  most  of  the  finer  drift  materials  has  been  carried  away,  the 
boulders  remaining  because  too  heavy  to  be  transported. 

SIMS. — 234.2  miles.     (142.0  miles.)     Altitude,  1,959  ^eet- 

West  of  Sims  the  railroad  turns  abruptly  south  and  descends  a  coulee 
six-  miles,  turning  again  to  traverse  another  valley  for  twenty  miles  to 
the  prairie  surface  west  of  Glen  Ullin.  About  Sims  are  some  small  hills 
of  drift  thickly  strewn  with  boulders,  the  last  drift  hills  and  large  boulders 
observed,  westward  bound.*  A  projecting  chimney  from  a  coal  mine 
shows  that  it  is  the  Laramie  formation  that  is  now  being  crossed,  a 
formation  which  lies  above  the  sandstones  and  shales  farther  east,  and 
in  which  are  the  North  Dakota  coal  beds. 

ALMONT. — 239.1  miles.     (136.3  miles.)     Altitude,  1,914  feet. 

North  of  railroad  a  fine  "park"  of  sandstone-capped  hills.  The 
lower  hills,  those  which  have  been  eroded  more,  are  rounded  at  their 
tops.  Farther  west  a  pretty  row  of  beehive-shaped  buttes,  tipped  with 
red  from  colored  sandstone  or  clay.  Two  high,  pointed  buttes,  the  first 
genuine  "Bad  Land"  buttes  observed.  Same  range  of  hills  becomes  grass- 
covered  farther  west,  as  the  valley  becomes  less  deep  and  less  erosion  has 
occurred. 

GLEN  ULLIN. — 265.6  miles.  (119.6  miles.)  Altitude,  2,067  feet- 
Population,  272. 

Low  flat  buttes  south.  Some  lofty  peaks  mar-k  the  higher  level  of  an 
older  landscape  which  has  been  mostly  carried  away.  Eagles  Nest  is  one 
of  these,  a  few  miles  west. 

HEBRON. — 269.1  miles.  (107.1  miles.)  Altitude,  2,157  feet.  Pop- 
ulation, 182. 

East  of  Hebron  is  the  divide  between  streams  tributary  to  the  Big 
Muddy  and  the  Heart  on  the  south,  and  the  Knife  River  on  the  north. 
The  streams  have  not  yet  cut  deeply,  and  the  general  landscape  is  an 
expanse  of  grassy  prairie. 

ANTELOPE. —  (Stark  County.)  278.5  miles.  (97.2  miles.)  Altitude, 
2,405  feet. 

The  railroad  here  runs  upon  the  divide  between  the  Heart  and  Knife 
Rivers.  Tributaries  from  both  these  rivers  push  up  upon  the  prairie. 
This  is  therefore  what  may  be  called  the  high  prairie.  North  of  the  rail- 
road stands  a  pointed  butte  with  naked  sides,  its  crest  reach-ing  far  above 
the  general  landscape.  Another  is  south  of  the  track,  thinly  covered  with 
grass.  These  isolated  peaks,  standing  alone  on  the  landscape,  their  tops 

*  See  footnote,  page  324 


THE  NORTHERN  PACIFIC  LINES.,  345 

composed  of  horizontal  layers  of  sandstone,  show  that  a  vast  amount  of 
erosion  has  occurred,  for  once  the  layers  of  sandstone  were  continuous 
over  the  whole  region  and  the  general  level  of  the  landscape  was  above 
where  these  tops  now  are. 

TAYLOR. — 289.5  miles.     (86.7  miles.)     Altitude,  2,484  feet. 

Taylor  marks  the  highest  point  of  the  railroad  east  of  the  divide 
between  the  Heart  and  Little  Missouri  Rivers. 

GLADSTONE. — 297.2  miles.      (79.0  miles.)     Altitude,  2,345  feet. 

Well  marked  terraces  are  shown  along  the  streams  south  and  west 
from  the  railroad.  West  toward  Lehigh  two  naked  buttes  stand  south 
of  railroad.  One  is  nearly  "worn  out,"  being  a  mere  thumb  standing 
upon  the  prairie.  The  other  is  larger,  and  has  hard  sandstone  shelves 
projecting  from  its  sides  which  protect  it  from  so  rapidly  wearing  away. 
The  flat  tops  and  projecting  shoulders  of  many  buttes  are  thus  explained. 

LEHIGH. — 304.0  miles.     (72.2  miles.)     Altitude,  2,343  feet. 

The  extensive  Lehigh  Coal  Mines  on  south  side  railroad. 

Dickinson — 308.6  miles.  (67.6  miles.)  Altitude,  2,401  feet.  Pop- 
ulation, 2,076. 

Three  broad  table  lands,  or  mesas,  covered  with  grass,  northeast. 
Northwest  of  the  city  the  small  hills  are  crested  with  sandstone  crags. 
High,  naked  buttes  south  in  distance. 

FRYBURG. —  (Billings  County.)  334.3  miles.  (41.9  miles.)  Altitude, 
2,761  feet. 

Steadily  ascending  all  the  way  from  Mandan,  the  summit,  or  divide, 
between  the  Heart  and  Little  Missouri  Rivers  has  now  been  reached. 
Mandan  is  at  the  mouth  of  the  Heart  River,  with  an  altitude  of  1,644 
feet;  Fryburg  is  117  miles  (by  section  lines,  136  miles  by  rail)  west, 
with  an  altitude  of  2,761  feet,  or  1,116  feet  higher.  Now,  in  a  distance 
of  twelve  miles  (by  section  lines,  fourteen  miles  by  rail)  a  fall  of  500 
feet  is  made  into  the  valley  of  the  Little  Missouri.  Then,  in  a  distance 
of  twenty  miles  the  ascent  is  made  to  the  high  prairie  again  through  a 
vertical  rise  of  750  feet  to  an  altitude  west  of  Sentinel  Butte  of  2,801 
feet.  Within  this  narrow  but  deep  valley  lies  the  famed  "Bad  Lands." 
And  this  deep  valley  is  at  once  the  cause  and  the  explanation  of  the  Bad 
Lands.  The  Little  Missouri  River  has  a  steep  bed,  and  it  therefore  cuts 
down  rapidly.  This  gives  to  its  inflowing  tributaries  a  high  gradient,  and 
these  in  turn  cut  their  channels  rapidly.  The  result  is  that  the  landscape 
along  the  course  of  the  Little  Missouri  is  deeply  intersected  by  streams. 
The  flat-topped  buttes  are  the  hills  which  have  not  yet  been  worn  away 


346  THE  STORY  OF  THE  PRAIRIES. 

so  as  to  make  their  tops  round.  The  high  table  lands  are  fragments  of 
the  old  prairie  which  has  been  thus  cut  up  by  the  streams.  The  hard 
sandstone  layers,  such  as  were  observed  in  the  journey  west  from  Man- 
dan,  give  to  the  hills  many  of  their  remarkable  features,  just  as  they  gave 
the  jutting  shoulders  and  projecting  crags  to  many  hills  along  the  Heart 
River. 

SULLY  SPRINGS. — 340.0  miles.   (36.2  miles.)     Altitude,  2,571  feet. 

Just  west  of  the  station  the  railroad  passes  through  the  Petrified 
Forest.  No  shade  is  afforded  by  this  "forest,"  and  the  trees  have  long 
since  ceased  to  shed  their  leaves!  These  ancient  monarchs  of  a  ''dead 
past,"  these  giants  whose  branches  once  wafted  in  the  breezes  of  the 
Cretaceous  Age,  have  fallen,  and  their  immense  trunks  now  strew  the 
ground.  The  stumps  on  which  they  grew  still  stand,  buried  in  the  rocky 
soil  in  which  they  grew,  mutely  testifying  to  a  glory  long  past, — of  a 
"forest  primeval."  Truly  it  may  be  said: 

"This  was  the  forest  primeval.     The  murmuring  pines  and  the 

hemlocks, 
Bearded   with  moss,    and  in   garments    green,    distinct  in  the 

twilight, 

Stood  like  Druids  of  old,  with  voices  sad  and  prophetic, 
Stood  like  harpers  hoar,  with  beards  that  rest  on  their  bosoms. 
Loud  from  its  rocky  caverns,  the  deep-voiced  neighboring  ocean 
Spoke,  and  in  accents  disconsolate  answered  the  wail  of  the 

forest ! 
Filled  was  the  air  with  a  dreamy  and  magical  light;  and  the 

landscape 
Lay  as  if  new-created  in  all  the  freshness  of  childhood." 

But  this  was  long,  long  ago.  What  we  see  is  the  tomb  in  which  the 
"Forest  Primeval"  was  buried,  the  strata  of  rock  which  were  deposited 
over  them,  and  which  have  in  later  time  been  removed  by  erosion.  On 
both  sides  of  the  railroad  many  stumps  stand  where  they  grew.  Immense 
logs  four  feet  in  diameter  lie  near  the  track.  Pyramid  Park  lies  to  the 
left  (south),  a  magnificent  view.  Pyramid  shaped  buttes,  large  and  small, 
white,  naked  walls  of  rock,  flat  topped  tables  and  smaller  rounded  cones. 
Descending  the  valley  the  buttes  become  red  on  their  crests,  capped  with 
lava.  Rough  crags  of  scoriaceous  rock  project  from  many  sides.  At 
Scoria  the  buttes  appear  as  though  dyed  in  blood.  The  small  stream, 
Sully's  Creek,  has  cut  down  through  a  lava  bed  which  was  spread  over 
the  ancient  sea-bottom  which  was  here  "before  ever  the  hills  were 
formed." 


THE  NORTHERN  PACIFIC  LINES.  347 

Medora. — 348.2  miles.      (27.5  miles.)     Altitude,  2,261  feet. 

Medora  lies  in  the  "heart  of  the  Bad  Lands."  The  nearly  perpen- 
dicular walls  of  rock  rise  400  feet  from  the  Little  Missouri  River  to  their 
tops,  which  represent  the  prairie  level.  The  horizontal  strata  of  the 
Cretaceous  rocks  are  magnificently  exposed  to  view.  Sandstone,  clay, 
shale,  and  lignite  coal  lie  in  alternate  bands  from  base  to  top  of  the  buttes. 

SENTINEL  BUTTE. — 365.8  miles.  (11.4  miles.)  Altitude,  2,703 
feet. 

After  crossing  the  river  the  railroad  follows  down  its  west  bank  to 
the  mouth  of  Andrew's  Creek,  up  which  it  passes  to  the  high  prairie. 
High  rugged  buttes  rise  steep  on  either  side  the  narrow  deep  valley.  A 
fine  view  of  a  group  of  haystack-shaped  buttes  is  obtained  from  the  north 
window,  several  miles  west.  Sentinel  Butte  stands  high  above  the  sur- 
rounding prairie  six  miles  south  of  the  station.  The  top  of  this  butte  is 
said  to  be  the  highest  point  in  North  Dakota.  The  butte  gets  its  name 
from  a  pathetic  incident  in  the  campaign  of 'the  lamented  General  Custer 
against  Sitting  Bull,  in  1876.  The  "pass"  through  the  top,  which  may 
be  seen  from  east  of  the  station,  was  guarded  by  two  soldiers  during  a 
night  when  it  was  anticipated  an  attack  might  be  made  by  the  Indians 
upon  the  army  encamped  upon  the  plain  north  of  the  butte.  In  the  morn- 
ing when  relief  was  sent  to  the  guards  their  bodies  were  found  pierced 
with  arrows.  Their  bodies  were  buried  one  on  either  side  of  the  pass 
they  had  guarded,  and  their  graves  are  marked  by  two  large  piles  of 
stones. 

STATE  LINE. — 376.2  miles.    Altitude,  2,811  feet. 

The  highest  point  of  the  Northern  Pacific  Railway  in  North  Dakota 
is  reached  at  the  instant  of  crossing  the  State  line  into  Montana.  The 
western  boundary  is  almost  exactly  on  the  watershed,  or  divide,  between 
the  Little  Missouri  and  Beaver  Creek,  the  railroad  then  descending  to  the 

valley  of  the  Yellowstone. 

*********** 

FARGO  SOUTHWESTERN  LINE. 

Fargo — (See  p.  218.) 

The  railroad  crosses  the  level  plain  of  the  bottom  of  Lake  Agassiz  for 
twenty-five  miles. 

LEONARD. — Distance  from  Fargo,  28.0  miles.     Altitude,  1,052  feet. 

The  railroad  here  passes  from  the  level  lake  bottom  upon  the  plateau 
of  the  Sheyenne  Delta,  rising  more  than  eighty  feet  in  a  distance  of  two 
miles,  and  crossing  the  McCauleyville,  Campbell  and  Tintah  Beaches  of 


348  THE  STORY  OF  THE  PRAIRIES. 

Lake  Agassiz,  which  extend  along  the  delta  front.  South  the  delta  sand 
is  in  places  piled  into  dunes  by  the  action  of  the  wind. 

SHELDON. — (Ransom  County.)  40.5  miles.  Altitude,  1,079  ^eet- 
Population,  318. 

Surface  of  the  delta  slightly  undulating.  The  sand  is  piled  into  dunes, 
notably  south.  The  western  edge  of  the  delta,  and  of  the  lake,  is  at 
Sheldon.  The  change  in  the  landscape  is  at  once  seen  toward  the  west, 
where  the  hills  become  the  familiar  drift  hills,  with  occasional  high  knobs. 

Lisbon — 55.3  miles.     Altitude,  1,089  feet     Population,  1,046. 

Deep  valley  of  the  Sheyenne  River.  A  well  marked  broad  terrace  of 
the  larger  glacial  river  on  west  side  of  valley.  Suburbs  of  the  city  built 
upon  its  top.  Terrace  seen  also  north  of  the  city  on  east  side  of  valley, 
from  west.  The  Dovre  Moraine  lies  along  the  western  bluffs  of  the  river. 
A  cut  in  the  gravelly  terrace  west  of  the  city  shows  finely  stratified  sands. 
From  the  prairie  west  of  the  valley  the  broad  outlines  of  White  Stone 
Hill  may  be  seen  eight  miles-  south.  This  is  a  pre-glacial  hill  rising  150 
feet  above  the  prairie  and  veneered  with  drift. 

ELLIOTT. — 62.8  miles.    Altitude,  1,330  feet. 

West  of  Elliott  is  another  pre-glacial  hill  rising  about  sixty  feet. 

ENGLEVALE. — 67.7  miles.    Altitude,  1,342  feet. 

An  old  channel  about  three  miles  in  width,  having  a  flat  bottom,  was 
occupied  by  the  Sheyenne  River  when  that  stream  discharged  into  Lake 
Sargent.  A  deeper  part  of  the  channel  a  mile  to  a  mile  and  a  half  west 
of  Englevale  is  known  as  the  Big  Slough.  When  the  glacial  Sheyenne 
River  flowed  here  the  ice  of  the  great  Ice-Sheet  had  not  melted  off  from 
the  .region  about  Lisbon,  and  the  Dovre  Moraine  west  of  Lisbon  was 
being  formed. 

VERONA. — (LaMoure  County.)     75.6  miles.     Altitude,   1,385  feet. 

Between  the  channel  of  the  glacial  Sheyenne  River  and  Verona  the 
Waconia,  or  Sixth,  Moraine  is  crossed. 

LaMoure — 87.0  miles.     Altitude,  1,308  feet.     Population,  457.- 

The  city  lies  in  the  broad  valley  of  the  James  River.  Terraces  occur 
along  the  west  side  of  the  valley.  Fine  undulating  prairie  west  of  the 
valley. 

BERLIN. — 97.0  miles.     Altitude,  1,469  feet. 

That  trees  can  be  successfully  grown  on  these  prairies  is  proven  by 
a  fine  grove  of  cultivated  trees  at  Berlin.  Good  farm  buildings  bespeak 
the  thrift  of  the  farmers  in  this  section.  In  the  distance  along  the  western 
horizon  rises  the  blue  outline  of  the  great  plateau,  the  Coteau  du  Missouri. 


THE  NORTHERN  PACIFIC  LINES.  349 

EDGELEY. — 108.5  miles.     Altitude,  1,567  feet.     Population,  306. 

The  Coteau  highland  rises  eight  to  ten  miles  west.  East  of  Edgeley 
the  hills  of  the  Antelope,  or  Third  Moraine  are  crossed.  Drift  hills  also 
occur  along  the  foot  of  the  plateau  west. 

MONANGO. —  (Dickey  County.)  C,  M.  &  St.  P.  Railway.  122.6 
miles.  Altitude,  1,501  feet. 

Low  round  hills  and  hollows  of  the  Antelope  Moraine  crossed  near 
Monango.  Crossing  Bismarck  Branch  of  Soo  Railway. 

Ellendale — 135.0  miles.     Altitude,  1,446  feet.     Population,  750. 

Low  rolling  hills  of  the  Antelope  Moraine  six  miles  west.  In  the 
distance  fifteen  to  twenty  miles  west  the  highland  of  the  Coteau  du 
Missouri  rises  suddenly  to  an  elevation  of  more  than  2,000  feet.  All 
about  Ellendale,  and  east  and  south  is  a  fine  farming  section. 


CHAPTER  THE  THIRTIETH. 
GEOLOGY  FROM  A  CAR  WINDOW— THE   SOO  LINE. 

FAIRMOUNT. —  (Richland  County.)  Distance  from  St.  Paul,  201.3 
miles.  (Distance  east  of  Portal,  359.0  miles.)  Altitude,  983  feet. 
Population,  284. 

The  Soo  Line  enters  North  Dakota  at  Fairmount,  in  the  southeast 
corner  of  the  State,  and  passes  in  a  northwesterly  direction,  crossing  the 
International  Boundary  at  Portal.  Fairmount  is  located  a  mile  and  a 
half  west  of  the  Bois  des  Sioux  River,  on  the  level  axis-plain  of  Lake 
Agassiz. 

OSWALD. — Distance  from  Fairmount,  5.8  miles.  (Distance  east  of 
Portal,  353.2  miles.)  Altitude,  987  feet. 

Level  prairie  from  Fairmount  westward,  but  now  begins  to  be  slightly 
undulating,  and  soon  broken  into  short,  choppy  sand  billows,  the  wind 
blown  sands  of  the  Sheyenne  Delta. 

HANKINSON. — 14.5  miles.  (344-5  miles.)  Altitude,  1,068  feet. 
Population,  713. 

Rising  conspicuously  from  the  prairie  south  of  Hankinson  stands  a 
large  dune  150  feet  high,  covered  scatteringly  with  trees,  known  as 
Lightning's  Nest.  A  tract  of  dunes  from  ten  to  thirty  feet  high  and 
mostly  covered  with  grass  extends  to  the  northwest.  Lightning's  Nest 
has  been  built  up  from  the  sands  of  the  Herman  Shore-Line,  where  it 
crosses  the  Sheyenne  Delta.  The  Norcross  Beach  passes  close  east  of 
Hankinson  as  a  well  defined  sand  ridge.  The  hills  of  the  Dovre  Moraine 
are  a  prominent  range  south  and  west. 

MANTADOR. — 22.0  miles.     (337.0  miles.)     Altitude,  1,027  ^ee^- 

The  railroad  crosses  the  tract  of  dunes  which  extends  from  Light- 
ning's Nest.  Beyond  the  dune  tract  fine  level  prairie.  Wild  Rice  River 
is  crossed  north  of  the  dune  tract. 

WYNDMERE. — 31.9  miles.      (327.1  miles.)     Altitude,  1,060  feet. 

Fine  level  prairie  about  Wyndmere  and  south.     North  the  surface  is 

35° 


THE  SOO  LINE.  351 

broken  into  swells  and  hollows  of  wind-blown  sand.  Farther  north  still 
the  knolls  become  sharper  in  outline  and  the  road-bed  cuts  through  them, 
showing  the  white  delta  and  beach  sand  of  which  they  are  composed. 
For  forty-five  miles  from  -Hankinson  to  Anselm  the  Soo  Road  passes 
over  the  delta  plain  of  the  glacial  Sheyenne  River.  The  sand  of  this  delta 
is  piled  by  the  wind  into  knolls  often  fifty  feet  high,  and  this  gives  the 
landscape  its  peculiar  appearance.  Nothing  but  wind-blown  sand  could 
form  hills  such  as  these.  Where  the  surface  does  not  become  grass- 
covered,  the  sand  drifts  precisely  as  does  dry  snow,  the  hills  slowly  travel- 
ing across  the  plain  as  the  sand  is  continually  carried  up  over  the  crests 
of  the  hills  and  falls  down  the  other  side. 

SANDOUN. — (Ransom  County.)  44.2  miles.  (314.8  miles.)  Alti- 
tude, 1,074  feet. 

Billowy  dunes  rise  ten  to  fifty  feet  or  more,  the  hollows  between  being 
often  filled  with  water.  Hills  mostly  thinly  covered  with  grass. 

VENLO. — 53.8  miles.     (305.2  miles.)    Altitude,  1,062  feet. 

The  Sheyenne  River,  which  runs  at  the  west  side  of  the  Sheyenne 
Delta,  is  crossed  between  this  and  the  next  station.  The  Herman  Beach, 
the  highest  shore-line  of  Lake  Agassiz,  is  a  little  south  of  the  River,  but 
is  so  much  broken  up  that  it  is  not  easily  recognized.  The  Big  Bend  of 
the  Sheyenne,  ten  miles  south,  marks  the  place  where  the  great  glacial 
river  discharged  into  Lake  Agassiz  at  the  time  the  large  delta  was  built. 

ANSELM. — 57.6  miles.     (301.4  miles.)     Altitude,  1,085  ^eet- 

Cuts  in  the  valley  side  made  in  grading  the  railroad  show  the  strati- 
fied sands  and  gravel  of  the  delta.  High  dunes  rise  in  the  distance  east. 
Anselm  is  just  off  from  the  delta  plain,  and  the  different  aspect  of  the 
landscape  is  at  once  apparent.  The  prairie  becomes  gently  rolling  with 
occasional  high  round  knobs,  morainic  hills.  There  are  no  hills  of  this 
character,  no  morainic  "knobs,"  on  the  area  covered  by  Lake  Agassiz, 
which  is  what  is  known  as  the  "Red  River  Valley." 

ENDERLIN. — 66.1  miles.  (292.9  miles.)  Altitude,  1,082  feet.  Pop- 
ulation, 636. 

Enderlin  is  situated  in  the  valley  of  the  Maple  River,  here  a  deep 
glacial  valley  such  as  the  Sheyenne.  Fine  prairie  north  to  Lucca  and 
Fingal. 

FINGAL. —  (Barnes  County.)  79.2  miles.  (279.8  miles.)  Altitude, 
1,277  feet-  Population,  376. 

The  rapid  rise  in  elevation  here  is  due  to  the  railroad  passing  upon 


352  THE  STORY  OF  THE  PRAIRIES. 

the  Manitoba  Escarpment,  the  highland  which  formed  the  western  side 
of  the  pre-glacial  Red  River  Valley. 

CUBA. — 84.8  miles.     (274.2  miles.)     Altitude,  1,352  feet. 

The  hills  of  the  southern  loop  of  the  Fergus  Falls  Moraine  appear  in 
the  east  and  north. 

LANONA. — 90.9  miles.     (268.1  miles.)     Altitude,  1,387  feet. 

Knobs  and  irregularly-shaped  hills  of  the  Fergus  Falls  Moraine. 

Valley  City — 95.8  miles.  (263.2  miles.)  Altitude,  1,227  feet- 
Population,  2,446. 

Valley  City  is  located  in  the  broad  and  deep  valley  of  the  Sheyenne. 
The  station  is  two  miles  north  of  the  city.  The  hills  which  form  the  sides 
of  the  valley  rise  150  to  200  feet.  Much  of  the  material  which  was  eroded 
by  the  great  glacial  stream  which  cut  this  large  valley  makes  up  the  delta 
plateau  which  has  just  been  crossed.  (See  p.  219.) 

ROGERS. — 109.5  miles.      (249.5  miles.)     Altitude,  1,422  feet. 

The  railroad  ascends  by  a  narrow,  crooked,  deep,  and  boulder-strewn 
coulee  nine  miles  to  the  beautiful  level  prairie  about  Rogers.  A  rise  of 
nearly  200  feet  has  been  made  in  this  distance.  Blue  shale  is  exposed 
in  many  cuts. 

LEAL. — 115.4  miles.     (243.6  miles.)     Altitude,  1,465  feet. 

Morainic  hills  of  the  Waconia,  or  Sixth,  Moraine. 

WIMBLEDON. — 123.6  miles.  (235.4  miles.)  Altitude,  1,468  feet. 
Population,  226. 

Fine  level  tract  of  prairie  lying  between  the  Waconia  Moraine,  which 
is  seen  in  the  distance  to  the  east,  and  the  Elysian,  or  Fifth,  Moraine,  the 
low  swells  of  which  are  seen  here.  Shallow  lakes  occupy  many  hollows. 

COURTNEY. —  (Stutsman  County),  129.8  miles.  (229.2  miles.) 
Altitude,  1,523  feet.  Population,  346. 

Broad  tract  of  prairie  again,  between  the  Elysian  and  Kiester,  or 
Fourth,  Moraines.  Many  boulders  strew  the  prairies,  and  shallow  lakes 
without  outlets  show  that  as  yet  drainage  systems  have  not  become 
established. 

KENSAL. — 139.4  miles.     (219.6  miles.)     Altitude,  1,541  feet. 

Kensal  is  situated  among  the  hills  of  the  well-marked  Elysian  Mo- 
raine. From  here  the  railroad  descends  to  the  Valley  of  the  James 
River.  The  course  of  the  river  for  more  than  twenty  miles  lies  amid 
the  hills  of  the  Kiester  Moraine,  the  hills  and  the  river  seeming  to  be 
in  a  struggle  for  the  mastery!  South  of  the  railroad  bridge  the  river 
broadens  gut  to  form  Arrowood  Lake,  the  valley  being  blocked  by  the 


THE  SOO  LINE.  353 

drift,  which  nearly  fills  it.  North  of  the  bridge  the  river  is  a  broad, 
sluggish,  pooling,  lake-like  stream.  Fine  examples  of  morainic  hills 
are  here  displayed.  Some  high  knobs  of  this  moraine  are  nearly  200  feet 
high.  Upon  rising  from  the  Valley  of  the  James  the  great  Missouri 
Plateau,  the  Coteau  du  Missouri,  appears  in  the  distance  west  about 
twenty  miles. 

BORDULAC. —  (Foster  County),  152.4  miles.  (206.6  miles.)  Alti- 
tude, 1,530  feet. 

Low  morainic  hills  of  the  Kiester  Moraine  in  distance  east.  Lakes 
George  and  Bordulac  are  broad  shallow  glacial  pans,  their  waters 
hemmed  in  by  low  morainic  hills. 

Carrington — 161.1  miles.  (197.9  miles.)  Altitude,  1,579  ^eet- 
Population,  1,150. 

The  Soo  Railway  passes  through  a  fine  tract  of  farming  country  in 
Foster  and  Wells  Counties,  along  the  upper  James  and  Sheyenne  Rivers. 
The  highland  of  the  Missouri  Plateau  rises  thirty  miles  west.  In  the 
distance  to  the  east  the  high  knobs  of  the  Kiester  Moraine  can  be  seen, 
fifteen  miles  away.  Hawk's  Nest,  an  outlying  fragment  of  the  great 
plateau,  stands  fifteen  miles  southwest.  It  is  a  high  drift-covered  pinnacle 
of  the  old  landscape  before  the  Ice  Age. 

LEMERT. — 168.8  miles.     (190.2  miles.)     Altitude,  1,594  feet. 

Small  ranges  of  low  morainic  hills  cross  the  broad  prairies. 
Many  large  granite  boulders  are  strewn  along  the.  track  between 
Lemert  and  Cathay.  It  is  noticeable  that  many  of  these  have  one  side 
planed  off  smooth  and  flat.  When  examined  closely  many  of  these  flat 
surfaces  are  found  to  be  marked  with  parallel  lines,  or  striations.  This 
shows  that  they  have  been  carried  long  distances,  and  planed  off  in  the 
process  of  being  shoved  over  hard  surfaces. 

CATHAY. — (Wells  County),  176.2  miles.  (182.8  miles.)  Altitude, 
1,584  feet. 

Beautifully  undulating  and  rolling  crest  of  the  moraine  which  was 
noticed  west  of  Carrington  now  plainly  in  view  west. 

EMRICK. — 181.6  miles.     (177.2  miles.)     Altitude,  1,597  feet. 

Morainic  ridges  west,  probably  belonging  to  the  Antelope,  or  Third, 
Moraine. 

Fessenden — 188.6  miles.  (170.4  miles.)  Altitude,  1,610  feet. 
Altitude  James  River,  low  water,  1,591  feet.  Population,  637. 

Low  morainic  ridges  south  and  west,  well  defined.  Occasional  hum- 
mocky  knobs,  such  as  are  characteristic  of  terminal  moraines.  The  mo- 


354  THE  STORY  OF  THE  PRAIRIES. 

raine  which  was  crossed  at  the  James  River,  and  which  filled  its  valley, 
is  still  seen  in  the  east  and  north  frbm  about  Fessenden. 

MANFRED. — 195.0  miles.    (164.0  miles.)    Altitude,  1,605  feet. 

A  prominent  cluster  of  hills  west,  a  morainic  heap,  the  crests  of  the 
ridges  giving  the  moraine  a  rugged  appearance.  A  small  "glacial  lake" 
hemmed  in  by  the  hills  lies  close  north. 

HARVEY. — 205.0  miles.  (154.0  miles.)  Altitude,  1,596  feet.  Shey- 
enne  River,  low  water,  1,527  feet.  Population,  590. 

Low  water  of  the  Sheyenne  is  sixty-nine  feet  below  the  prairie  sur- 
face, while  that  of  the  James,  less  than  ten  miles  south,  is  only  nineteen 
feet.  The  Sheyenne  is  thus  shown  to  have  been  the  great  avenue  of 
escape  for  the  waters  of  the  melting  ice-sheet,  from  this  portion  of  the 
State.  Moraine  with  high  rugged  hills  west.  Moraine  also  east  in  dis- 
tance. Fine  tract  of  prairie  intervening  between. 

ANAMOOSE. —  (McHenry  County),  221.5  miles.  (137.5  miles.)  Al- 
titude, 1,620  feet.  Population,  430. 

Approaching  Anamoose  high  and  rugged  moraines  lie  on  both  sides 
of  the  railroad.  A  lake  hemmed  in  by  the  hills  south.  High  knobs 
mark  the  surrounding  hills.  West  of  Anamoose,  east  of  the  railroad,  is 
a  large  valley  having  distinct  terraces  on  its  sides,  and  a  broad,  flat 
bottom,  with  no  stream  upon  it,  and  many  boulders  scattered  upon  the 
terraces.  Such  a  deep  and  well-defined  valley,  having  no  stream  on  its 
bottom,  and  having  well  marked  terraces,  shows  by  its  form  that  it  is 
the  channel  of  a  glacial  stream,  a  stream  which  ceased  when  the  waters ' 
from  the  melting  ice-sheet  had  disappeared,  and  the  terraces  mark  the 
flood-plain  of  the  stream  during  its  earlier  stages,  before  its  channel  had 
been  cut  down  to  the  present  bottom. 

Still  further  west  the  railroad  runs  upon  the  bottom  of  a  broad  level 
channel,  having  extensive  hay  meadows  and  shallow  lakes  along  its 
course.  A  dry  lake  southwest  from  Balfour  lies  in  this  channel,  which 
is  the  old  southern  outlet  of  Lake  Souris,  at  an  earlier  stage  than  that 
when  its  waters  escaped  to  the  Sheyenne  by  the  Big  Coulee  outlet. 

BALFOUR. — 236.1  miles.     (122.9  miles.)    Altitude,  1,613  feet. 

A  few  rods  west  of  the  station  the  track  crosses  the  famous  "Balfour 
Ridge,"  a  beach  of  gravel  and  sand,  which  extends  from  two  to  three 
miles  south  of  Balfour,  north  by  northwest  for  about  fifteen  miles,  to 
the  Mouse  River,  at  Pendroy.  Where  the  railroad  crosses  it  a  section 
showing  the  sand  and  gravel  in  layers  is  exposed.  The  ridge  rises  six  to 
eight  feet  above  the  prairie  at  its  southern  end,  and  becomes  gradually 


THE  SOO  LINE.  355 

higher  toward  the  north.  It  is  about  thirty  feet  high  at  its  northern 
end.  The  smooth  and  uniform  surface  and  sloping  sides,  about  equal  in 
height,  make  it  appear  much  like  a  railroad  grading,  and  it  has  been 
surveyed  and  set  apart  for  use  as  a  public  highway.  The  level  crest  of 
the  ridge  can  be  seen  from  the  east  window  for  some  distance  west  of 
Balfour.  Southwest  of  Balfour  about  twenty  miles  rises  the  blue  and 
hazy  head  of  Dog  Den  Butte.  This  is  a  large  outlying  hill  of  the  Mis- 
souri Plateau.  Its  crest  is  crossed  by  several  morainic  ridges,  and  small 
lakes  are  on  its  top.  The  low  and  level  prairie  east  of  Dog  Den  is 
known  as  the  "alkali  flats."  Many  shallow  alkaline  lakes  with  shores  of 
white  sand  lie  along  the  tract. 

VOLTAIRE. — 251.3  miles.      (107.7  miles.)     Altitude,  1,587  feet. 

Westward  from  Balfour  the  old  outlet  channel  of  Lake  Souris  is  a 
mile  or  more  in  width,  seen  west  of  the  railroad.  Extensive  hay-meadows 
lie  upon  its  bottom.  From  Voltaire  the  railroad  descends  to  the  Mouse 
River  "bottoms"  by  the  steep,  sharp  valley  of  Spring  Creek.  This  coulee 
is  a  notch  or  channel  cut  in  the  bottom  of  the  old  outlet  channel  since 
the  waters  of  Lake  Souris  disappeared. 

VELVA. — 256.3  miles.     (102.7  miles.)     Altitude,  1,525  feet. 

West  of  Velva  deep  coulees  with  steep  sides  border  the  valley  of  the 
Mouse.  The  highland  along  the  valley  on  the  west  was  the  shore  of 
Lake  Souris. 

Minot — (Ward  County),  277.4  miles.  (81.6  miles.)  Altitude, 
1,557  ^eet-  Population,  1,277. 

The  valley  of  the  Mouse  is  a  great  trough  eroded  by  a  great  glacial 
river,  its  bottom  being  one  to  two  miles  across,  and  the  hills  forming 
the  sides  of  the  valley  rising  1 50  to  200  feet  above  the  flat  bottom.  The 
sides  of  the  valley  are  beautifully  serrated  by  little  coulees,  as  though  a 
giant  hand  had  drawn  a  coarse  comb  across  the  hillsides  and  made  the 
little  furrows,  or  coulees.  (See  p.  206.) 

BURLINGTON. — 285.2  miles.     (73. 8  miles.)     Altitude,  1,590  feet. 

Here  is  the  point  of  meeting  of  the  Des  Lacs  and  Mouse  Rivers,  both 
of  which  flow  in  large  glacial  valleys.  The  Soo  Road  follows  the  course 
of  the  Des  Lacs  Valley,  traversing  the  bottom  of  the  valley  more  than 
forty  miles.  The  valley  was  eroded  by  the  glacial  flood  waters  deeply 
into  the  shales  which  underlie  the  drift.  Coal  mines  are  opened  by  tun- 
neling from  the  hillsides  along  the  valley.  The  Burlington  mines  are 
extensively  operated.  (See  Fig.  71,  p.  167.) 

FOXHOLM. — 295.2  miles.     (63.8  miles.)     Altitude,  1,657  feet. 


356  THE  STORY  OF  THE  PRAIRIES. 

Fine  examples  of  terraces,  marking  the  flood  plain  of  the  river  at  an 
earlier  time  before  its  valley  had  been  eroded  to  the  present  bottom.  One 
such  terrace  plateau  lies  on  the  east  side  of  the  railroad  west  of  Burling- 
ton, rising  twelve  to  fifteen  feet  above  the  railroad  grade.  It  is  almost  per- 
fectly flat  on  top,  and  strewn  with  many  boulders.  West  of  Foxholm 
another  fragment  of  the  older  flood  plain  occurs,  about  ten  feet  high. 
Approaching  Carpio,  the  terrace  is  well  developed  on  west  side  of  valley. 

CARPIO. — 306.6  miles.     (55.4  miles.)     Altitude,  1,696  feet. 

Layers  of  brown  sandstone  outcrop  in  the  sides  of  the  high  banks 
west.  •  Black  layers  indicate  lignite  coal  in  thin  seams.  Nearing  Donny- 
brook  are  seen  fine  examples  of  "alluvial  fans,"  soil  carried  down  to  the 
valley  bottom  by  streams  flowing  in  the  steep  coulees  and  spreading  out 
upon  the  flat  plain. 

DONNYBROOK. — 3i2.7miles.     (46.3  miles.)     Altitude,  1,760  feet. 

The  town  stands  upon  one  of  the  alluvial  fans  just  mentioned.  On 
the  west  side  of  the  valley,  where  two  coulees  enter,  a  butte  has  been 
formed,  its  sides  steep,  its  top  flat.  Sandstone  and  clay  are  exposed  in 
horizontal  layers  on  the  south  and  east  sides.  On  the  east  side  of  the 
valley  opposite  Donnybrook  a  line  may  be  traced  along  the  side  of  the 
valley  about  half  way  to  the  top  of  the  hillside,  by  the  difference  in  the 
vegetation  above  and  below  the  line.  This  marks  the  depth  of  the  drift 
which  overlies  the  sandstones  and  shales  which  are  the  "bed  rock."  The 
Des  Lacs  River  is  a  very  small  stream,  little  more  than  a  meadow  ditch 
which  a  small  boy  could  jump  across.  Its  course  is  very  crooked,  show- 
ing that  it  flows  very  slowly.  Such  is  the  modern  representative  of  the 
great  glacial  stream  which  carved  the  deep  broad  valley  on  the  flat  bottom 
of  which  this  tiny  rivulet  now  meanders.  The  bottom  of  the  Des  Lacs 
valley  in  the  upper  half  of  its  course  is  covered  by  a  series  of  lakes. 
These  are  there  simply  because  there  is  not  enough  fall  to  the  bottom  of 
the  valley  to  cause  the  water  to  run.  The  first  of  these  lakes  is  a  pretty 
sheet  extending  from  one  side  of  the  valley  to  the  other  and  about  two 
miles  long,  lying  about  eight  miles  west  of  Donnybrook. 

KENMARE. — 327.4  miles.  (3 1.6  miles.)  Altitude,  1,799  feet.  Alti- 
tude, low  water,  Des  Lacs  Lake,  1,783  feet.  Altitude,  top  of  hill  adjoin- 
ing, 1,950  feet.  Population,  300. 

Kenmare  stands  upon  the  hillside  overlooking  the  second  lake.  The 
lake  covers  the  entire  width  of  the  valley  bottom  so  that  the  shores  come 
down  abruptly  to  the  water's  edge.  A  hay-meadow  lies  upon  the  valley 
bottom  between  the  second  and  third  lakes,  the  latter  being  a  long  ribbon 


THE  SOO  LINE.  357 

of  water  half  a  mile  to  a  mile  in  width,  and  extending  along  the  valley 
bottom  thirty  miles  to  the  International  Boundary.  Along  the  sides  of 
the  valley  at  Kenmare  are  the  machinery  and  tracks,  and  the  openings  to 
the  very  extensive  coal  mines  for  which  Kenmare  and  the  State  of  North 
Dakota  are  noted.  Sandstone  rock  suitable  for  building  purposes  is 
obtained  from  the  hillsides,  evidences  of  wrhich  are  seen  in  the  substantial 
buildings  constructed  from  this  stone  in  the  city  of  Kenmare.  West  of 
Kenmare  the  railroad  leaves  the  Des  Lacs  valley,  laboriously  climbing  up 
the  side  of  the  valley  and  emerging  upon  the  beautiful  level  prairie.  At 
once  the  lake  has  disappeared  from  sight,  for  the  eye  scans  the  prairie 
only  to  look  directly  across  the  valley,  which  lies  entirely  below  the  gen- 
eral prairie  level,  a  deep  flat  bottomed  trough  cut  in  the  great  plain.  If 
any  further  proof  were  needed  that  this  is  a  valley  of  glacial  erosion  this 
would  serve  the  purpose,  for  the  country  along  the  stream  course  would 
be  cut  into  hills  if  the  valley  had  been  cut  by  the  ordinary  development  of 
a  drainage  system. 

BOWBELLS.— 339.6  miles.  (19.4  miles.)  Altitude,  1,958  feet.  Pop- 
ulation, 398. 

A  splendid  prairie,  unbroken  by  any  coulee  or  mark  of  drainage.  The 
horizon  line  in  the  east  is  a  straight  line  unbroken  by  any  hill  or  eleva- 
tion. In  the  west,  twenty  miles  a\vay,  rises  the  highland  of  the  great 
Coteau  du  Missouri.  The  horizon  line  in  the  west  is  rendered  undulating 
and  wavy  by  the  knobs  and  ridges  of  the  Altamont,  or  First,  Moraine, 
which  lies  along  the  plateau  top. 

FLAXTON. — 349.3  miles.     (9.7  miles.)     Altitude,  1,956  feet. 

Between  Bowbells  and  Flaxton  the  railroad  crosses  a  low  belt  of 
morainic  hills,  which  give  to  the  prairie  a  gently  rolling  aspect.  A  long 
slought  a  lake  during  very  wet  seasons,  a  fine  hay-meadow  usually,  has 
been  a  lake,  the  waves  of  which  have  beaten  upon  the  shores  forming  a 
wave-cut  terrace  along  its  border.  It  is  a  relic  of  the  flood  waters  from 
the  melting  ice-sheet. 

PORTAL. — 359.0  miles.     Altitude,  1,954  feet. 

Portal,  as  its  name  indicates,  is  the  "gate  city,"  standing  upon  the 
International  Boundary  between  North  Dakota  and  Assiniboia.  A  range 
of  sandy  morainic  hills  is  crossed  by  the  railroad  just  as  it  passes  into 
Canada.  Extending  far  south  is  a  fine  tract  of  prairie.  The  "Hills," 
the  great  Missouri  Plateau,  rise  majestically  against  the  sky  twenty 
miles  distant  in  the  west. 


358  THE  STORY  OF  THE  PRAIRIES. 

BISMARCK  EXTENSION 

HANKINSON. —  (Richland  County),  14.5  miles  from  Fairmount. 

LIDGERWOOD. — 26.6  miles.     Altitude,   1,090  feet.     Population,  585. 

About  four  miles  west  of  Hankinson  is  the  Herman  Shore-Line  of 
Lake  Agassiz.  Three  miles  southwest  the  hills  of  the  Dovre  Moraine 
are  100  to  150  feet  high.  This  moraine  lies  south  of  the  railroad  about 
two  miles  and  parallel  with  it  for  nearly  twenty-five  miles.  The  Herman 
Beach  is  about  six  miles  north  of  Lidgerwood.  On  the  broad  flat  prairie 
between  the  moraine  on  the  south  and  the  Herman  Shore  north  are  many 
broad  shallow  lakes. 

RANSOM. —  (Sargent  County),  38.0  miles.     Altitude,  1,128  feet. 

Cross  the  Wild  Rice  River.  The  Dovre  Moraine  is  here  crossed  by 
the  railroad,  a  belt  of  rolling  hills  about  a  mile  wide.  Many  granite 
boulders  occur  scattered  upon  the  prairie  east  and  west  of  the  moraine. 
On  the  western  side  of  the  moraine  was  the  eastern  shore  of  Lake  Sar- 
gent. (See  p.  117.) 

Forman — 49.7  miles.     Altitude,  1,247  feet-     Population,  257. 

At  Forman  the  depth  of  the  water  of  Lake  Sargent  was  about  fifty 
feet.  At  Perry,  six  miles  east,  it  was  about  100  feet,  and  along  the  east- 
ern side  of  the  lake  near  the  Dovre  Moraine,  about  150  feet.  Many 
boulders  are  scattered  upon  these  prairies. 

NICHOLSON. — 61.3  miles.    Altitude,  1,305  feet. 

Nicholson  is  near  the  western  shore  of  Lake  Sargent.  To  the  north 
is  a  hill  two  to  three  miles  long,  north  and  south,  covered  with  a  smooth 
veneering  of  drift,  a  pre-glacial  hill.  Westward  from  Nicholson  the 
railroad  crosses  a  belt  of  morainic  hills  about  six  miles  in  width,  a  com- 
pound moraine  representing  the  Waconia,  Elysian,  and  Kiester  Moraines. 

OAKES. — (Dickey  County),  72.6  miles.  Altitude,  1,320  feet.  Popu- 
lation, 668. 

West  of  the  compound  moraine  mentioned  the  northern  end  of  the 
plain  of  the  bottom  of  Lake  Dakota  is  crossed,  here  about  six  miles  in 
width. The  James  River  flows  south  across  this  old  lake  bottom.  (P.  116.) 
MERRICOURT. — 106.3  miles.    Altitude,  1,644  feet- 
Near  the  crossing  of  the  C,  M.  &  St.  P.  Railway,  ten  miles  east,  a 
low  range  of  hills,  the  Antelope  Moraine,  is  crossed.     The  landscape 
rises  quite  rapidly  here  toward  the  top  of  the  great  Plateau,  the  Coteau  du 
Missouri.     Low,  long,  undulating  and  rolling  swells,  the  hills  of  the 


THE  SOO  LINE.  359 

Gary  Moraine,  occur  westward  toward  Kulm.  The  train  toils  heavily 
up  the  steep  grade.  The  broad  rolling  hills  rise  twenty-five  to  forty  feet 
above  the  hollows,  and  the  crests  stand  400  feet  above  the  plain  to  the 
east. 

KULM. —  (LaMoure   County),    118.8   miles.    Altitude,    1,966   feet. 
Population,  463. 

Kulm  is  on  the  high  prairie  of  the  Missouri  Plateau,  a  gently  roll- 
ing, broad  expanse  of  prairie.  Northwest  from  Kulm  the  landscape  is 
marked  by  broadly  rolling  swells.  Extensive  hay-meadows  in  the  low, 
broad  sloughs.  Many  small  granite  boulders  lie  upon  the  surface.  Far- 
ther west,  in  southeastern  Logan  County,  the  landscape  is  more  rough, 
hills  steep,  long  hay-meadows  in  old  glacial  drainage  channels.  Railroad 
often  cuts  through  the  hills,  showing  gravel  and  drift  clay.  Boulders 
strewn  upon  surface.  West  of  this  belt  of  hills  the  surface  is  more 
smooth.  Wave  cliffs  and  terraces  on  the  sides  of  sloughs  show  wrhere 
have  been  lakes  during  the  time  of  the  melting  of  the  ice-sheet.  Frequent 
alkali  lakes  among  the  hills  west. 

LEHR. —  (Mclntosh  County),  139.3  miles.     Altitude,  2,017  feet. 

The  Altamont  Moraine  is  crossed,  with  hills  high  and  steep.  Rail- 
road winds  among  the  hills,  with  frequent  cuts.  Hills  150  to  200  feet 
high,  with  steep  boulder-strewn  sides.  Railroad  follows  old  drainage 
channel,  with  steep  grade  westward,  rising  onto  the  immense  ridge  or 
belt  of  the  Altamont  Moraine. 

WISHEK. — 149.8  miles.     Altitude,  2,010  feet. 

Between  Lehr  and  Wishek  is  one  of  the  most  majestic  developments 
of  a  terminal  moraine  crossed  by  any  line  of  railway  in  the  State.  The 
height  of  the  moraine  is  from  2,000  to  2,075  ^ee^  above  sea  level  and 
rises  200  feet  above  the  nearly  level  prairie  on  either  side.  The  belt 
where  crossed  by  the  railroad  east  of  Wishek  is  about  eight  miles  in 
width,  and  is  one  of  the  most  striking  morainic  regions  in  the  State. 
The  deep,  well-marked  valleys  having  no  streams  of  importance  in  them 
indicate  the  action  of  glacial  flood  waters  at  the  time  these  and  later 
ranges  of  morainic  hills  were  being  formed  along  the  edge  of  the  Great 
Ice-Sheet.  Many  deep  hollows  containing  lakes,  having  clearly  cut  ter- 
races on  their  shores  showing  the  higher  stage  of  the  water  at  a  former 
time,  broad  hay-meadows,  which  were  once  lake  bottoms,  and  long  chan- 
nels marked  by  high  terrace  flood-plains,  tell  of  the  great  amount  of 
water  which  once  was  here.  The  hills  are  very  high  and  steep,  and 
strewn  with  boulders.  The  landscape  is  one  almost  inaccessible  to  travel 


360  THE  STORY  OF  THE  PRAIRIES. 

through  overland,  except  on  horseback.  And  then  the  traveler  is  very 
likely  to  lose  his  way,  the  high  knob  which  was  taken  as  a  guide  treacher- 
ously allowing  another  to  be  mistaken  for  it!  A  broad  valley,  an  old 
drainage  channel  from  the  Altamont  Moraine  to  the  Missouri  River, 
lies  west  of  Wishek,  along  which  the  railroad  runs.  This  valley  is  broad 
and  deep,  having  flat  bottom  and  well-defined  terraces  along  its  sides.  A 
branch  of  the  railroad  south  to  Ashley  follows  this  channel. 

NAPOLEON. —  (Logan  County),  171.0  miles.     Altitude,  1,951  feet. 

From  Wishek  the  railroad  runs  nearly  northwest  to  Napoleon,  follow- 
ing the  bottoms  of  glacial  channels,  broad  and  flat  bottoms  with  small 
streams,  or  none  at  all.  The  sides  of  the  valleys  are  steep,  owing  to  the 
Fox  Hills  Sandstone,  which  forms  the  surface  layer  of  rock,  thinly  over- 
laid with  drift.  Two  large  drainage  channels  meet  at  Berry  Lake  west 
of  Napoleon.  A  terrace  of  gravel  and  sand  fills  the  lower  part  of  these 
valleys  to  a  height  of  about  twenty-five  feet  above  the  water  of  the  lake. 
Traces  of  this  terrace  are  seen  along  the  valley  running  west. 

CAMPBELL. —  (Emmons  County),  180.9  miles.     Altitude,  1,896  feet. 

Terraces  well  shown  along  valley,  which  is  followed  by  the  railroad. 
A  cut  shows  brown  shaly  sandstone  in  thin  strata. 

BRADDOCK. — 187.9  miles.     Altitude,  1,860  feet. 

From  Campbell  west  the  railroad  follows  the  deep,  broad  valley, 
marked  terraces  occurring  along  its  sides.  The  valley  is  more  than  100 
feet  below  the  general  level  west  of  Campbell.  Morainic  hills  occur 

north,  but  these  are  largely  concealed  from  view  by  the  high  valley  walls. 
*********** 

ASHLEY. —  (Mclntosh  County),  167.8  miles.    Altitude,  1,998  feet. 

Ashley  is  eighteen  miles  southeast  of  Wishek.  The  railroad  follows 
large  glacial  drainage  channels  through  most  of  the  distance.  Many 
conspicuous  channels  of  this  character  occur  in  this  neighborhood.  No 
part  of  the  State  offers  a  more  interesting  field  for  the  study  of  glacial 
drainage  than  this  region,  in  Mclntosh  and  Logan  Counties.  High  boul- 
dery  terraces  and  chains  of  lakes  along  these  old  lines  of  drainage  give 
the  landscape  a  unique  appearance.  The  Altamont  Moraine,  which  was 
crossed  east  of  Wishek,  extends  nearly  parallel  with  the  line  of  the  rail- 
road as  far  south  as  Ashley,  when  it  extends  eastward  to  about  the  edge 
of  the  great  Missouri  Plateau  in  southwestern  Dickey  County.  The  hills 
of  this  range  rise  from  100  to  150  feet  in  height  between  Wishek  and 
Ashley,  and  in  the  southwestern  township  of  Dickey  County  the  higher 
knobs  are  nearly  200  feet  high,  their  high  crests  standing  conspicuously 


THE  SOO  LINE.  361 

against  the  sky,  as  seen  from  the  east,  500  to  600  feet  above  the  plain  to 
the  east.  Ashley  stands  upon  a  nearly  level  plain  about  six  miles  square, 
having  a  deep,  fine,  silt-like  soil,  as  though  it  had  been  the  bottom  of  a 
lake  for  a  long  time.  A  larger  plain  of  similar  character,  though  not  as 
nearly  level,  extends  over  a  large  region  west  of  the  high  morainic 
range. 


APPENDIX. 


TABLES  SHOWING  AVERAGE  PRECIPITATION  BY  YEARS  AND  BY  STATIONS,  ALSO  THE 
MONTHLY  PRECIPITATION  FOR  APRIL,  MAY,  AND  JUNE,  AND  THE  MEAN  ANNUAL  PRECIPI- 
TATION FOR  ALL  STATIONS. 


Bismarck 

Fort  Abercrombie 

Fort  Buford 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

1861 

3-95 
1.82 
.04 

•45 
4.20 

3-72 
•45 
•83 
2.16 

•32 
1.36 
1.50 

2.OO 
.70 

•43 
•74 
1.70 

6.67 
1.61 

.87 
•38 
•83 

.20 
2.14 
2.48 

4-32 
4.04 

•3° 
4.2O 
2.  2O 
1-70 

3-*7 
•56 
2.06 

1.85 

•95 
.26 
1.72 
1.46 

2.00 
6.83 

3-05 
1.02 
2.OI 
4.10 
IO.I5 

3-65 
8.16 
2.96 

•50 

23-34 
11.38 
13.40 
16.85 
17-52 
12.54 
19.66 
19.47 
22.73 
21.37 
15.20 
27.82 

8-59 

1862 

1863 

1864 

1865  ... 
1866 

1867  .  . 

.06 
•33 
•65 
.00 

•45 
i-55 
I.2S 
•IS 

1.83 

.10 

•13 

1-85 
2-75 
•74 
i-34 
•94 
.48 
1.30 
1.71 
2.25 
1.09 
.61 
.60 
.60 
1.88 

•42 
1.79 
1.78 
3-92 

2-43 

1.  12 
6.60 

1.  80 

i-39 

4.00 

4-5° 
2.60 
2.56 
4.02 

1.  00 

1.61 

•59 
.14 

1.02 

i-44 
i-59 
.96 
2.69 

i-59 

1.49 

1.27 
3-21 
.86 

•77 
.90 

J-75 
2.69 

1.02 
3-46 

J-75 
2.04 

3-i5 
3-35 
5-46 
3-44 
1.87 

•97 
•99 
6.05 

•93 
3-25 
6-75 
1.03 

5-23 
7.08 

11.50 
9.41 
9.90 
8.19 
16.80 

7"  58 
14-85 
12.34 
12.29 

19.67 

23-25 
14.90 
12.73 
10.82 
7-37 
!5-56 
10.24 

J5-43 
14.74 
8.46 
14.24 
18.98 

1868  . 

1869  ... 
1870  .  .  . 
1871  ..  . 
1872  ..  . 
1873  ... 
1874  ... 
1875  ... 
1876  ..  . 
1877  ... 
1878  ... 

1879  ... 
1880  ..  . 
1881  ... 
1882  ... 
1883  ... 
884  ... 

1889  ''  '• 
1890  ..  . 
1891  ..  . 

Av.  Annual  for 
each  Station 

4.22 

2-77 
1.32 

5-7i 
2.60 

3-65 
i.  02 

3-56 
i-57 

2.20 
3.2I 
1.49 

i-S2 
.11 

.26 

.68 
2.40 

3-40 
5-74 
4-15 
3-15 
3-67 
2.76 
2.27 
3-46 

1-15 

2.56 
.92 

i-73 
2.19 

.70 
3-35 
•57 
2.92 

5.02 
1.24 
4.60 
2.78 
4-97 
3-32 
4.11 
3.88 
3-84 
2-63 

2-39 
2.03 

•85 
5-77 
1.03 
8.40 
4.19 

27.52 
30.92 
17.68 
20.23 
20.61 

19-75 
!5-76 

2i-33 
15.66 

23-36 
13.08 
13.26 

l6-33 
16.51 
11.03 

15-75 
20.50 

17.68 

362 


363 


TABLES   SHOWING  AVERAGE  PRECIPITATION— Continued. 


Fort  Pembina 

Fort  Totten 

Average  Annual  f<>r  all  Stations 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

1861 

1862 

1863  .. 

1864  .. 

1  86s 

1866 

1867 

1868 

I  =;    4.8 

1860 

j.^  .40 
16  .  o? 

1870 

4.0 

£  3  tr 

en 

i  ^  20 

1^.20 

1871 

i  87 

I   04 

f    QI 

I  7  O  3 

i  T.  .  47 

1872  ..  . 

2.OO 

1.90 

2.09 

17.19 

3-J5 

I.IO 

1.66 

19.00 

20.  20 

1873  ... 

•39 

2.  II 

2.91 

14.05 

•57 

3-75 

4.68 

17.30 

15-72 

1874  ... 

.20 

!-55 

3-4i 

11.88 

.62 

i-43 

2.52 

16.71 

12  .06 

1875  ... 

•47 

1.87 

3-83 

J3-53 

i-54 

2-77 

6.25 

22.17 

19.52 

1876  .  .  . 

-49 

6-55 

3-43 

25-75 

.42 

3-92 

I.IO 

14.40 

18.40 

1877  ... 

.68 

4-15 

9-85 

21.67 

•47 

4.41 

5-12 

18.84 

17  .62 

1878  ... 

5.78 

2.52 

3-57 

^3-83 

5-i9 

2-38 

2.90 

22.45 

25-50 

1879  ..- 

•34 

i-54 

3-9o 

J9-31 

.14 

3.80 

3-9° 

*9-T-5 

19.68 

1880  .  .  . 

•59 

7.98 

4-98 

27-35 

.24 

4-38 

3-1? 

22.24 

23-I5 

1881  ..  . 

.70 

3-94 

3.10 

19.26 

•30 

2-05. 

3-88 

18.15 

17  .02 

1882  .  .  . 

•50 

2.50 

3-34 

2.40 

1.30 

4-3° 

18.58 

17-55 

1883  ... 

1.67 

i.  80 

1.26 

1.71 

1.79 

1.42 

J7-93 

14.80 

1884  ... 

1.86 

!-25 

2.38 

1.20 

2.50 

17.36 

16.03 

1885  ... 

5-90 

1.40 

J-95 

*7-37 

3-°7 

1.70 

3-45 

18.69 

16.18 

1886  ..  . 

2.85 

i-55 

3.60 

29.24 

•85 

2-75 

2-79 

14.22 

16.24 

1887  .  .  . 

2.80 

3-73 

3-94 

23-36 

•63 

i-57 

5-57 

I9-3S 

18.62 

1888  ..  . 

.69 

•56 

8.41 

17.99 

-65 

.60 

7.41 

16.13 

16.34 

1889  ..  . 

•7i 

.10 

1.42 

n-75 

•78 

.62 

1.56 

10.51 

10.44 

1890  .  .  . 

1.41 

1.07 

5-84 

1.97 

-79 

6.84 

.... 

14.99 

1891  ..  . 

1x6 

2.^8 

6  34 

2  ^   Q"? 

21.77 

Av.  Annual  for 

each  Station 

17.77 

Amenia 

Ashley 

Beach 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

1892    ..  . 

3.12 

i-95 
2.42 
1.24 
4-92 
2.66 
i-54 
•97 
1.91 

•45 
3-84 

1.  21 

2-34 
1.27 

2.14 
1.30 
.81 
2.92 
3-34 
•77 
2-44 
4.22 
.30 
.89 
1.86 
1.74 
2.90 
4.71 

7-44 

5-9° 
4.20 

4-63 
.68 

4-33 
.96 
2.94 
2.60 
1.48 
4.72 
3.56 



.... 

1893    ..  . 

15.68 

18.73 
16.64 

25-58 
16.55 
9.40 
17.88 

13-85 
14.00 
16.43 

1894    ..  . 

1895    ..  . 

1896    ... 

1897    ..- 
1898    ..  . 
l899    .. 

6.41 
1.49 

i.  60 

3.56 

1.  12 

3-20 

4.13 

•74 
.69 

3-J9 
3-36 
1.32 

5-45 
4.06 
t.38 

2.25 
6.85 
2-51 
3-27 
1.68 

s'-36 
•54 
6.30 

3-7° 
4-47 
3-40 

22.15 
18.19 

20.61 
10.40 

24-13 
21.65 
21.88 
24.82 

21.  II 
20.56 

1900    .  .  . 
1901    ..  . 
1902    ..  . 
1903    ..- 
1904    ... 
1905    .-. 
1906    ..  . 

1907    •  •  • 

Av.  Ann  ual  for 
each  Station 

1.92 
1.90 
1.42 
1.63 
2.27 
1.56 
2-34 
.80 

.... 

20.03 
22.48 

17.27 

•35 

1.97 

3-9° 

.... 

364 


TABLES   SHOWING   AVERAGE    PRECIPITATION— Continued. 


Berlin 

Berthold,  Fort 

Bismarck 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

1892  .  .  . 

1  893  ... 
1894  ... 
1895  ... 
1896  ... 
1897... 
1898  ... 
1899... 
1900  ..  . 
1901  ..  . 
1902  ..  . 

1903  .-  • 
1904  ..  . 

1905  ... 
1906  .  .  . 
1907  .  .  . 

AT.  Annual  for 
each  Station 

4.07 
2.88 
4.21 
1.58 
5-12 

.83 

1.41 
1.30 
1.03 

1.  00 

3-3° 
1.69 
2.47 

I.OI 

3-03 
.66 

•71 

2.0O 
4.OI 
.72 

3-31 

•35 
4-51 
1.90 

2.  II 

4-56 
6-37 
3-23 

4.86 
1.49 
5-46 
4.61 

3-22 
6.30 
1.83 

•95 
6-37 
4.01 
i.  80 
5-40 
3.02 

4-27 
2.27 

20.83 

12.  02 

I7-85 
16.62 

28.93 
22.52 

23-63 
19.58 
22.68 

25-45 
18.78 
17.92 

20.47 

-69 

2-53 
2.23 
1.40 

1.  12 

'•Is 
.61 

1.38 

.07 

.85 
.67 

1.26 

3-8o 
1.98 

1.  10 

2.65 

4-3° 
1.26 

.04 

3-0° 
3.20 

•77 
1.87 

5-37 
1.98 

4-33 

4.01 
2.64 
3-44 

1.21 

5-57 
2.32 

3*63 
1.44 

4-36 
5.61 

4-78 

13-74 

16.92 
16.63 
M-33 

17^88 

J5-95 
17.96 
14.17 
17.19 

I  8'.  2  2 
18.24 

3-24 

4.04 

-   .70 

•33 
i.  20 
.96 
•47 

•3° 

.07 
1.77 

•3° 

3.02 
2.76 
7.71 
.177 
2.04 
7-79 

2.50 

1.  1  8 
4-78 
•59 

2-15 
4.19 
7.08 
i.  06 
2.24 
8.08 

14-83 

11.90 
14.69 

4.02 

5-34 
6-35 

3-05 

13.66 

14.08 

Bottineau 

Buford,  Fort 

Buxton 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

1802 

*vy*  .  .  . 
1893  .-. 
1894  ... 
1895..- 
1896 

.10 

2.OO 

.80 

.89 
•63 

4-05 

4-35 

I.  21 

3-74 
6.94 

•38 

4-79 

1.84 

26.96 

17.49 
17.27 
21.49 
10.62 

21.  IO 
I9-I5 

5.85 
.90 

2.17 
1.49 

2.27 

2.12 
.84 
2-51 

6.66 
1.56 
3-25 
4-73 
.46 
.11 
4-56 
2-93 
1.68 

5.38 
1.90 
4-48 
2.85 
.61 

2.04 
.29 

1897  ... 
1898  ... 

1899  .-. 
1900  .  .  . 
1901  ..  . 
1902  ..  . 

1903  •  •  • 
1904  .  . 

1905  •  • 
1906  ..  . 
1907  .-  • 

iv.  Annual  fo 
each  Station 

•55 
.20 

.10 

T 

•37 
0.69 

•29 

•05 
2.96 
.70 

4.10 
4.02 
1.07 
6.00 
4.08 
.16 

3-11 
4-63 

16.06 

7.08 
3-3° 

12.98 

2   48 

15.90 

i  ^ 

4.84 
1.90 

20.53 
13.16 

1.79 
.61 

3-9° 
1.71 

8.81 
3-40 

22.53 
13-55 

Cando 

Church's  Ferry 

Coal  Harbor 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

1892 

5-25 
3-42 
2.90 
4.68 

2-97 
4.20 

3-74 
•53 
7-45 
3-45 
•99 
7.17 
4.72 

3-24 

1801 

,11 

1.46 
5-98 

1.20 
1.26 

3-29 
.32 
.08 

.49 
1.72 

.89 
.07 

•79 
1-75 
i-95 
4.66 

•55 

2.21 
3.00 

.66 

.00 

3.87 

2.17 

1.20 

i-53 

16.64 

26.69 
I3-S7 
23-39 

20.  IO 
22.52 
18.91 
19.08 
I3-42 
23-35 

18.86 

2.72 
1.90 

1.  12 

1.88 
•42 
T 
T 
T 

1-34 
.84 

.98 
•30 

3-67 
•79 

•99 
6.06 

.82 
-38 
2.84 

".78 
1-83 
4-85 

3-55 
3-55 
2.28 

2.49 
-  1.98 

3-°4 
4.60 
4.40 

6.37 
6.04 
3-66 
2-39 

21.29 
12.58 

18.22 
19.26 
IS«37 

21.  8l 

18.25 

1  80  «? 

1806 

1807 

1898 

n  ' 
l8OO  .. 

IQOO  .. 

1901  ..  . 
IQO2 

.26 

4.70 

14.72 

1903  .-  • 
1904  ... 

1906  ..  . 
1907  ... 

AT.  Annual  fo 
each  Station 

i-37 
.01 
.84 

•54 

3.82 
1.49 

J-75 
3.01 

•13 

1.78 
9.84 
3-88 
3-°3 
5-58 

z'6.83 
13-24 

365 


TABLES  SHOWING    AVERAGE    PRECIPITATION— Continued. 


Cooperstown 

Devils  Lake 

Dickinson 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

1802 

3.60 

•45 
2.40 

1.36 

2-35 
1.63 
i.  02 
1-83 
•65 
.62 
.16 

•31 
.92 
.09 

I.IO 

•3° 

1.77 
2.90 
.90 
1.69 
5-i6 
•73 

2.OO 

3-51 
.48 

•J3 
3.02 

3-59 
.90 
2.74 
7.11 
1.36 

2.  2O 

i-45 

3*28 

2-54 

1.30 
2-59 

-i 

2.56 
.1.18 

6.10 

3-75 
5-40 
2.52 

11.67 

is'.is 

11.92 
17.27 
11.78 
12.92 

!5-J9 
16.55 
20.46 

is.  14 

^!y     •  • 
i8cn    , 

5-65 

1804.  . 

3-78 
5.16 

1.81 

180*  .. 

1806 

^    ' 
1807 

I.IO 

.19 
i.56 

I.IO 

.24 
.24 
2.18 
1-52 

.10 

i.*5 

.70 

.80 

J.39 

2.84 

.22 
.IO 

3-°3 
4.06 
2.47 
1.67 
4-05 
•35 

4-43 
3-5° 

2.21 
2.06 
8.27 

3-99 
•77 
5-64 
4.41 
2.13 
4.88 

16.09 
16.99 
24.14 
20.29 
16.27 
18.24 
21.41 
18.50 
IS-49 

18.60 

1808  . 

1899  ... 

IOOO  .. 

IQOI  . 

IOO2 

1903  ••  • 
1904  ..  . 

1905  ••  • 
IOO6 

".89 

i.  6  1 
1.99 

4.07 
5.00 
4.70 

1907  ..  . 

Av.  Annual  for 
each  Station 

.08 

.18 

3-91 

Donnybrook 

Dunseith 

Ellendale 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

1802  .. 

4-5o 
2.63 

2.07 

•77 

4-i3 
3.62 

18.02 
IS-77 

180^ 

1804. 

*  "V4*  •  •  • 

1  80* 

1.81 

2.14 

2.40 
2.70 
•34 
-85 
4.07 
2.03 
3.26 

3-3i 

5.12 
•94 
3-20 
•36 
3-25 
2-75 
1.14 

5-12 

J3-35 

10.03 
17.99 
22.07 
18.85 
20.49 
15.11 
16.59 

«  9  * 
1806    . 

1807  . 

66 

06 

I  41 

1898  .. 

1.23 

I.  21 
2.O4 
1.  14 
I.I5 

J-55 
2.30 

1899  ... 
1900  .  .  . 
1901  ..  . 
1902  ..  . 

1903  .-  • 
1904  ..  . 

1905  ..  • 
1906  ..  . 
1907  ..  . 

Av.  Annual  for 
each  Station 

•97 

•32 
•74 
•39 
1.30 

•3° 

i-ol 

•36 

1.70 

•32 
2-58 
6.52 
1.96 
1.88 
5-i3 

.20 

2.90 
•65 
5.78 
3-11 

2-51 

4.26 
4.69 
3-i7 
i-34 

13-25 

12.86 
22.79 

23-99 
15.20 
19.01 
19.83 

1.40 

•23 
.40 

.40 

.78 

.66 

7o 

i-75 
•27 
4-37 
2.07 

5-8i 

•54 
1-45 
2-75 

5-75 
.48 

4-31 
4.00 
1.16 
4.40 

3-77 

211 

18.62 
16.06 

16.44 

2.20 



18.13 

17-03 

16.83 

Edgeley 

Edmore 

Fargo 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

1802 

2.42 
2.63 

3-25 
1.36 

3-64 
.89 
.88 

J-39 
1.82 
1.76 
2.30 

i-34 
2.74 
1.28 

2.21 

3-88 

•77 
2.62 
1.62 
4.70 
•74 

4.15 
4.22 
.81 
.98 
4-25 
2.78 
1.47 
4.10 
3-°3 

i-93 

3.62 
6.23 
4.81 
2.41 
7.10 

2    25 

3-44 

2.  II 

5-91 
3-°7 
.06 

3-83 

5.00 

3-11 

20.92 
16.11 

16.05 
21.77 
22.50 
16.36 

21.21 

25-54 
25.40 
23.24 
21.91 
20.26 

17.70 

180^ 

1894  ... 
180^ 









•i<-»yo  •  >  • 
1806 

1807  . 

1898  ..  . 

1899  ... 
IOOO 

1901  ..  . 
1902  ..  . 

1903  ..  • 
1904  ..  . 

1905  ••  • 

1906  ..  . 

1907  ..  . 

Av.  Annual  for 
each  Station 

2-47 
2.85 

3-3° 
1.41 

1.58 
•35 

•*5 

3  94 
2.24 
1.29 
4-33 
5-59 

5-63 
5-9° 
!-57 
5-40 
3-48 
3-69 
1-73 

27.45 
21.25 
17.36 

19.96 

21.51 

1.30 

.80 

1.17 

2-35 
1.89 

2'.  6  2 
2.78 

IS-39 

20.69 

366 


TABLES   SHOWING   AVERAGE   PRECIPITATION— Continued. 


Flasher 

Forman 

Fullerton 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

1802 

1801 

3-9° 

•95 

3-49 

18.94 

J-35 
1.19 
1.74 
1.65 
2.09 
3-°4 
3-45 
1.40 
2.82 
.41 

1804  ... 

1895  ..  . 

*.-33 

5-32 

I-39 
1.19 

2.58 
2.72 
•35 
3-31 

4.46 

3-31 
5-56 
i.  02 

15-87 
21.09 
19.42 
17-74 

2.24 
3-03 
•44 
•36 
4-97 
2.06 
2.52 
6.  02 
8.08 
3-J7 

1896  ..  . 

1897  ..  . 

V.56 
4.04 
.66 
3.61 

3-29 
1.62 
4.60 
3-37 
4-43 
4-25 

14.36 
23.68 
22.04 
18.81 
22.97 
24.03 
20.88 
21.08 
33-87 

22.40 

1898  ... 
1899  ... 

1900  .  .  . 

IOOI 





2.28 
•5i 
i-75 

2.22 

2-59 
1.97 
2.52 

•3° 

•41 
.66 
4.04 
2-95 
3-03 
5.10 
7.16 
i-54 

•59 
5-56 
3-i6 
2-99 
5-93 
3-44 
3-92 
3.21 

21.15 

23-74 
20.86 
23-52 
22.36 

25-52 

20.93 

IQO2 

IQO3 

I9O4 

IQOt> 



1906  ..  . 

1907  ... 

Av.  Annual  for 
each  Station 

1.58 

5-76 
i-55 

6-45 

2.  2O 

Gallatin 

Gladys 

Glen  Ullin 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

1802  . 

1893  ... 
1894  ... 

1895  ... 
1896  ..  . 
1897  ... 
1808 

2.24 
3.88 

i-43 
6.26 

•77 

•83 
1.42 

3-07 
5-43 
•79 
2.50 
4.26 
•93 
•73 
3-52 

2.76 
2.66 

5-49 
2.18 

3-25 
2.80 

2.22 
1.84 
6-35 

2-45 

12.67 
15.66 
16.13 
27.26 
13.28 
13.02 
15.02 
17.19 

20.33 
16.80 



.... 



2.10 

1.17 
•93 
•57 
•43 
.42 

•43 
•47 
1.41 
.14 
i-i3 

3.16 

•84 
1.42 
1.30 
1.03 

•44 
2.83 

3-76 

1-43 
1.27 

7-55 
•59 

5-92 
2.36 

1.  12 

V-SS 

1899  ... 
1900  ..  . 
1901  ..  . 
1902  ..  . 
IQO^ 

i-34 
1.65 
1.78 
i-i3 

1.46 

15.81 

5-49 
2.69 

7-23 
6.05 

4-44 
i.  80 

19.30 

16.50 
18.74 

15-59 

IQO4 

IQO^ 

IOO6 

I  OO7 

•55 

i.  08 

2.99 

Av.  Annual  for 
each  Station 

16.74 

Grafton 

Hamilton 

Hannah 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

1892  ..  . 
1893  ... 
1894  ... 
1895... 
1896  ..  . 
1897  ... 
1898  ... 
1899  ... 
1900  ..  . 
1901  ..  . 
1902  ..  . 
IQO3 

2.36 

J-73 
2.28 
3.22 

4-75 
.40 

1.  10 

2.14 
•75 
•45 
1.25 
=;6 

2.85 
1.46 
1.25 
.90 
6.72 
.20 

x'°3 

1.76 

i.  20 

T 

2-75 
3-54 

2.IO 

4.70 

3-31 

.20 

4-45 
2.44 

7-45 
2.40 

00 

16.47 

10.84 
16.76 
25.12 
10.28 

12.80 

20.02 

.... 







•73 
1.71 
2.40 
.18 
.87 

2    t8 

1.84 
1.26 
3.10 
.20 

.00 

3-85 

1.78 
6.16 
3-72 
i.  06 
6.08 
4.10 

24.46 

23-05 
20.61 

18.44 
I7-73 

.... 

1904  .  •  . 
1905  ... 
1906  ..  . 

1907  .  •  • 

Av.  Annual  for 
each  Station 

1.20 

•05 

•97 
•5° 

2.50 

Vx" 

6.65 
2.91 

1  6.  1  8 
16.1  2 

2.o6 
.41 

•97 
1.70 

2.81 
4.00 

2.52 

*-iS 

8-55 
5-95 
3-27 

28.83 
25-59 

.64 

2.65 

1.  10 

5.60  % 
1.40 



22.67 

TABLES   SHOWING   AVERAGE   PRECIPITATION— Continued. 


367 


Hannaford 

Hillsboro 

Jamestown 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

1892  .. 

42  A 

3OI 
.01 

71A. 

1893  .. 

1804  . 

2.78 
2.48 
1.23 

6.20 
.62 
I.  II 

8s 

1.67 

.87 

!-52 
9-58 
1.03 
4.02 
212 

•34 

2.08 

4-93 
3-92 
2.04 
7.29 
1.94 

2    I  O 

14.56 
12.64 
33-09 
18.73 

1895 
1896  ... 

1807 





1898 

1899  ..  . 

1900  .  .  . 
1901  ..  . 
1902  ..  . 
1903  .  .  . 

1.30 
1.17 
.41 

•74 

.12 
3.36 

1.18 
7.91 
2-57 

14.92 
23.64 
16.62 

41 

i  6< 

.96 
.80 

i-33 
1.85 
1.28 
2.07 
•59 

•*3 
4-74 
2.24 

1.22 
4.II 
5-69 

J-39 

9.71 
3-52 
•5i 
7.09 

5-09 

2.20 

25.66 

16.89 
19.99 

22.12 
20.46 



1904  .  .  . 

1905  .  .  . 

.18 

1.  10 

6.10 

1006 

2.90 
1.29 

5-78 
i-37 

3-49 
3-87 

24.70 

1907 

Av.  Annual  fur 
each  Station 

18.39 

Kelso 

Kulm 

Lakota 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

1892  .. 

1893     .. 
1894  ... 
1895  ... 
1896  ..  . 
1807 

2.30 
2.79 

-65 
7.19 

•97 
*-73 
2.41 

6-35 

4-03 
3-46 
4.71 
•74 

16.38 
18.76 

3-38 

I  70 

I-3I 

3-90 
5-°4 
3.82 

4.90 

1898  ... 
1899  ... 

IQOO 

1.36 
1.84 

4-56 
4-36 

5.86 

IOOI 

1902 

I9CM 

I9O4 

2.20 

1.74 
2.60 
.67 

2.36 

5-Si 
6.46 
3.81 

7-44 
3-67 
5-52 
1.41 

I9O  ^ 

24.00 
25-31 

y    2 
1906  ..  . 

1907  .  .  . 



2.08 

•33 

4-45 

Av.  Annual  for 
each  Station 

Langdon 

Larimore 

Lisbon 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

1892 

1893     , 

1894  . 

2    71 

I   37 

i8ox 

1.19 

3-22 
.8l 

•53 
1.03 
1.24 
2.89 
.98 
.89 
2.32 
•59 
1-63 
•54 

2.24 

4-95 
2.96 

2.22 
.16 

•J7 
4-45 
J-75 
2.08 
2.38 
3.80 
•52 

6.17 

3-°9 
3.62 
1.82 
.90 

5-93 
2.88 
.70 
6.97 
4.01 
3.16 
3-92 

14-25 

;>y9  *  '  * 
1806 

1897  ... 
1898  ... 
1800    . 

•52 

I.OO 

1.19 
'•IS 

2-45 
5-36 

15.42 
i5-5o 
13-45 
19.58 
19.67 

23-35 
19.69 
22.75 
21.66 

'8.53 

1900  .. 

1901 

1902  .. 

1903  .. 

1.96 
4.18 

i.63 

2.60 
•37 

4-38 
1.71 

5-75 
5-38 
2.36 

2.41 
5-47 
5-04 
4.64 
2.98 

22.07 

2I-73 
27.08 

23-62 

1904  ... 
1905  ... 
1906  ..  . 
1907  .-  • 

Av.  Annual  for 
each  Station 

.16 
.91 

•77 

3-03 
3-54 

•55 

5-99 

7-58 
4.48 

!-39 

368 


TABLES   SHOWING   AVERAGE    PRECIPITATION— Continued. 


Mayville 

Manfred 

McKinney 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

1892 

1893  ... 

1804. 

2.06 
i.  60 
1.86 
1.65 

.87 
.61 

•°5 

.21 

T 

•5° 

1.46 
3.56 
4-65 
•32 

.01 

2.50 
.81 
T 
.78 
4.68 

4.71 

4-25 
6.82 
10.40 

3-i3 
5-i8 

•43 
5-9° 
1.50 

1-85 
3-35 
4-03 
2.58 
1.41 

14.29 
15.62 
20.06 
19.36 
iS-35 

15-73 
14-  51 
6.58 

15.28 
13-75 

i5-°5 

*uy«f  •  •  • 

i8o< 

1896  ... 
1897  ... 
1898  ... 
1899  ... 
1900  .  .  . 
1901  .  .  . 

IOO2 

5-85 
•49 
2.25 

i-37 

8.61 

•78 
2.84 

4-15 
.90 
.40 

4-57 
1.17 
i  69 

2'.67 
.27 
8.10 

2-51 

.04 

20.44 

1903  ... 

IQO4 

•05 

14.84 

J-59 
•33 
.68 

•77 

1.81 
1.98 
5-20 
•49 

6.76 
3.82 
3-90 
2-54 

19.11 
16.27 

IQOS  ... 

IOO6 

1.22 

3.66 

5-34 



.10 
I.OO 

.80 

2.83 
2.81 
•25 

1907  .  .  . 

AT.  Annual  for 
each  Station 

.38 

.40 

5.08 

Medora 

Melville 

Milton 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

1802 

1.85 

2.10 

4-75 
i-75 
8.51 

2.25 
i-39 

2.10 

3-97 

8-55 

1.94 
3-64 
4.28 
5.80 
5-07 

M.  31 
18-38 

x9-53 
20.85 

21  .56 

1893  ... 
1804. 

.18 

3-84 

.86 

180=? 

1896  ... 
1897  ... 

1899  .. 

•72 

2.20 
1-3^ 

5-1? 

•38 
3-4o 

4-97 
1.19 

2.80 

9-9° 

.86 

1.  21 

.38 
•52 
.80 
1.46 

•J5 
i.37 
1-25 
•15 

2-33 
4.18 

T49 

4.32 
2.4O 
1.30 

1-95 
3-8i 
1.24 

3.38 

2.02 
2.92 
6.7I 
3.66 
.48 

7-3° 
5-78 
3.08 

i-95 

18.20 
12.50 
17.08 

20.10 
18.24 
I3.6l 
13.89 

.88 
3.00 
.60 
•93 
•54 

V.78 

.00 
I.OO 

2.70 

.10 
.20 
4.98 
2.04 
1.94 

3-70 
3-35 
J-35 
6.10 

3-*7 
1-65 
8.23 

22.0O 

18.21 

17.94 

1900  .  .  . 
1901  ..  . 
1902  ..  . 
1903  •• 
1904  .-  • 
1905  .- 
1006 

•75 
.06 
.67 

.IS 

•30 

•25 

1.04 
.07 
2.64 
1.07 
.11 
i-*3 

6   22 

1-13 
5-44 
1.65 
2.32 

2.01 

4-31 

T3-57 
14.21 
14.00 

2.52 





1907  .-  • 

AT.  Annual  for 
each  Station 

.06 

.83 

2.85 

12.92 

16.23 

19.09 

Minot 

Minto 

Minnewaukan 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

1802 

1893  , 

I   37 

I   OO 

2    7  C 

1894  .  . 

2.88 
i-59 

5-23 

1.  10 

i.  08 

1.29 
1.86 

1.  12 

.88 

i-59 
.41 
1.52 
.62 

.96 
1.91 
6.30 

•83 
1.94 

•25 
•15 
3.68 

!-53 
2.70 

3-67 
2.68 

•53 

i-75 
4-32 
2-93 
1.81 

4-97 
3-°9 
1.86 

5-58 
3-94 
•65 
5.80 

4-55 
2.82 

4-13 

12.71 

J5-75 
22.65 

J3-97 
21.09 

19.89 
18.97 

20.50 
28.26 

T9-3T 

•74 

I.OO 
1.02 

T 

1.70 

•74 

.00 

".46 
i.  08 

2.48 
•54 

3'  7  6 
2.08 

i-37 
3.02 

5-05 
4-39 
2.49 

I.OO 

7.07 
3-i8 

1.20 

5-77 
6-53 

16.62 

*3-S9- 

14.72 

13.18 
17.88 

1895  ... 
1896  ..  . 

1897  •• 
1898  ..  . 
1899  ... 
1900  ..  . 
1901  ..  . 
1902  ..  . 
1903  ... 
1904  ..  - 
1905  .  •  • 
1906  .  .  . 
1907  .-  - 
Av.  Annual  for 
each  Station 

1.18 

i-S5 

1.40 

'  'T' 

2.46 
2.90 

1.03 
•36 

.66 

•05 
5-3i 

i.iS 

5-56 
1.50 

5-3° 
.16 

3.38 
3.00 
6.07 

i-95 
4-75 

5.06 
2.13 

8'.8i 
24.27 

20.97 
20.75 
18.70 

15.20 

369 


TABLES    SHOWING   AVERAGE    PRECIPITATION— Continued. 


Moyersville 

Napoleon 

New  England  City 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

1892  ..  . 

1893  ... 
1894  ... 

i8ox 

5-5° 
i-7S 
2.98 
1.98 
2.65 

Z13 
2.67 

.80 
.80 
1.26 
.181 
1.27 
2-37 
•65 
J-55 

.10 

2.67 

1.78 

1.23 
2.82 
2.63 
.67 
3-77 
4-15 
1.07 

.20 

4-39 
2.41 
2.06 
2.69 

3-29 
1.32 

4.89 
3-56 

3-25 

4.22 

3-44 
8.96 
2.07 
5-85 
3-45 

6.22 

4.18 
1.94 
4.64 

3-79 
4.01 
2.80 

26.60 
17.66 
16.29 
16.73 
21.56 
20.67 
19.83 
20.47 

22.22 
19.79 
20.79 
17.86 

!5'97 
18.29 
15.86 

JQ-37 

.... 

.70 
-63 

3.10 

2.00 

T3° 

•55 
•32 

1.24 

1.74 
2.30 
6.00 

.12 

J-59 
2.50 

I-3I 
.06 
2.68 

3-92 
1.40 
1.87 

3.10 

2-44 
.60 

1.20 
1.20 
1.40 

5-36 
1.  00 

1.24 

4.20 

3-97 
.70 
2.70 

12.38 

12.55 
15.81 

I3-5S 

1896 

1807 

1898 

1809  .  .  . 
1900  .  .  . 
1901  ..  . 
1902  ..  . 
1  003 

1  004 

1905  .  •  • 
1906  .  .  . 
1907  . 

'  .68 

1.78 
5.01 

3-52 
6.92 

Av.  Annual  for 
each  Station 

New  Salem 

Oakdale 

Oriska 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

1802 

4-34 

2.84 

2-37 
6.70 
.67 
2.16 
2-37 

i.  60 
4.48 
4.81 
5.08 
2.60 

4-49 
3-70 

16.54 
16.78 
21.47 
14.91 

*uy-*  •  •  • 
1893  ... 
1894  ... 
1895  ... 
1896 

2.  2O 

i-7S 

1.96 

10.27 

.62 

2-35 
1.92 
2.40 
i.  60 
1.96 
1.29 

2  A 

1897  ... 
1898 

1800 

1900  .  .  . 
1901  ..  . 
1902  ..  . 
IQO3 

•94 

.48 
.58 
•85 

1.90 

•5° 

.06 
2.30 
7-83 
i-34 
1.48 
7.87 
1.29 

7.62 
4.46 
2.26 
4.90 

7.96 

2-77 

26.15 
19.84 
26.02 
13-38 

25.06 

20.02 

1904  •  •  • 
1905  •  •  • 
1906  .  .  . 
1907  .  .  . 

Av.  Annual  for 
each  Station 

.12 

1.20 

2.42 

3-51 

.88 

4-56 
5-57 
!-33 

4.06 
4.16 
3-3° 

25-32 

Palermo 

Park  River 

Pembina 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

1802 

*«*y<«  •  •  • 
1803 

•••"yo  •  •  • 
1804. 

iSoe; 

i  64 

•95 

I    2Q 

5-51 

2  OO 

1896 

1897  ... 
1898  ..  . 

1800 

1900 

1.79 
i.  ii 

1.  01 

1.41 
1.09 

•39 
.90 
1.61 

.41 
.12 

4-75 
3-42 

3-27 
4.09 

2.70 
1.05 

.90 
4.60 

3-79 
2-54 
8.15 
4.46 
4.19 
2-39 

21.06 
16.50 

21.64 
27.81 
18.70 

2.12 
20.67 

IOOI 

1902 

1903  .. 
1904  .  .  . 

TQOC 

2.05 
.26 
•95 
•77 

1.71 
3-°4' 
2.96 

•49 

•6.57 

•5-53 
•3-4o 
4.01 

20.38 
25-32 

1906 

2    I  C 

1907  .  .  . 

Av.  Annual  for 
each  Station 

.60 

•25 

2-37 

370 


TABLES   SHOWING   AVERAGE    PRECIPITATION— Continued. 


Portal 

Power 

Pratt 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l, 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

1892  .. 

2-97 

1.22 

3-i3 

3-*5 
3.60 

1803  ., 

1894  ... 
1895  ... 
1896  ... 
1897  ... 
1898  ... 
1899  ... 

1900  .  .  . 
1901  ..  . 
1902  ..  . 

1903  ..  . 
1904  .  .  . 

IQO5 

2.50 
1.52 
2.40 

1-34 

.82 
.40 
T 

I.IO 

2.52 
1.25 

1.50 
2.81 
4.16 

•34 
.82 
1.26 
i-52 
.40 
2.83 
4-77 
.70 

3-98 

3-67 
4.24 
2.03 

3-4o 
4-55 
•5° 

6.12 

6.14 

3-J3 
3-16 

13-65 
19.48 
•16.24 
9-56 

14.17 
12.89 

23-45 

2-75 

"3 

4.19 
T 
2.81 

•5° 
1.32 
1.70 
2.17 

i-34 
2.82 
1.40 
2.91 

•25 

1.96 
1.04 

4.23 
.88 
2.31 
2.63 
.61 

•17 
3.86 

3-23 

I.OI 

6.09 

3-9° 
1.98 

3-51 
3-26 
3-52 

6.20 

2.36 

4.14 

2-39 
5-78 
2.66 
•74 
7-59 
3-95 
4.60 

4-73 

16.13 

18.89 
24.38 
20.36 

17.96 
26.11 

22.88 

18.37 

22.94 
28.31 

21.63 

'  '.80 
.64 

4-75 
.26 

3-42 
3-94 
2.08 

18.27 

1906  ..  . 

1907  ... 

Av.  Annual  for 
each  Station 

1.17 

.80 

3-3° 
•65 

7-95 
2.25 

20.97 
16.30 

Rolla 

Rugby 

Sentinel  Butte 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

1802 

1893  ... 
1894  ... 
1895  ... 
1896  ... 

1897  ..- 
1898 

1800 

IQOO 

1901 

1902  ..  . 

1903  . 
1904  .  .  . 
1905  ..  . 

1906  ..  . 

1907  .  .  . 

AT.  Annual  for 
each  Station 

.98 

•°5 
1.04 

1.76 
5-34 
5-44 

6.20 

6.65 
5-°9 

3°-39 

i  06 

8  is 

•IS 

2-35 

5.67 

2.06 

6.21 

3-8i 
7-23 

!-57 

Steele 

St.  John 

Sheyenne 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

1802 

180* 

1.28 
3-11 

2.20 
4.14 

•54 

.63 

2.OI 
I.I7 
4-22 
5-28 
I.OO 

.24 

4.19 
2.50 
6.00 

4-35 
2.49 

3-6i 

18.31 
17.64 
22.78 

14.36 

1894  ... 

1895  ... 
1896  ... 

1897..- 
1898  ... 
1899  ... 
1900  .  .  . 

dl 

3-87 
1.62 
1.46 

•57 
71 

I.IO 

2.61 

2.81 

1.04 

2.0& 

3-67 
1.1  A, 

1.42 

3-54 
2.18 
4-oo 

3-96 
L.ro. 

12.77 
J7-59 

1.58 
8.61 

•77 
.90 
2.05 
.06 

2.25 
6.28 
.69 

2-45 

3-51 

5-25 
5-20 

3.87 

3".  1  8 

1.87 

19.06 
31.21 
16.69 

1901  ..  . 
1902  ..  . 
1903  .•  • 
1904  .  •  • 
1905  ... 
1906  .  .  . 
1907  •  •  • 
Av.  Annual  for 
etch  Station 

T 

•*5 

.70 

•75 
.18 
1.25 

.21 

T1 

2-54 
2.06 

i-95 
2.31 
6.68 
1.38 

4-80 
4-9J: 

L35 
6.56 
3.16 

6.10 
2.91 

18.14 
18.91 
15-51 

I9-73 

.... 



17.11 

18.27 

22.32 

371 


TABLES   SHOWING   AVERAGE   PRECIPITATION— Continued. 


University 

Valley  City 

Wahpeton 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

1892  ..  . 
1893  ... 
1894  ... 
1895... 

1896  ..  . 
1897  ... 
1898  ... 
1899  ... 

1900  ..  . 
1901  ..  . 
1902  .  .  . 

1903  ••  . 
1904  .  .  . 

1905  ... 

1906  .  .  . 

1907  ..  . 

iv.  Annual  for 
each  Station 

2.90 
3-37 
3-°4 
•93 
5-J9 
.56 
4.16 
4.20 

1.  21 
2.06 
2.46 

•75 
'•53 
.96 
1.98 
.11 

2.42 
1.77 

•87 
1.94 
.96 
1.76 
2.32 
6.  ii 

•25 
.28 
3-88 

1.85 
1.70 

3-89 
3-°5 
.68 

3.20 
3-98 
3-4i 
1.40 
5.10 
1.84 

i-45 
1.28 

X-JS 

2-65 
1.79 

2-55 
2.83 

1-54 

I   04. 

5-36 

1.  12 

•97 
1.63 

7-43 
.87 
2.09 
5-66 

•43 
.80 
3.60 
2.27 
2.83 

5-29 
37O 

3-09 
2-45 
2.63 
6.60 
5-76 

6-95 
1.79 

4-i5 
3-09 
6-31 
2.48 

19.04 
IS-34 

3  3'  1  8 

28-55 
22.44 

23-03 
22.95 
29-75 

3-J9 

3-75 
6.74 

3-i5 
6.80 

17.97 
r7-36 

18.64 
23.91 

3-07 

1.  01 

1.82 

2-33 



.76 
1.50 

.42 
3-94 

6.32 
3-29 

17.88 
17.63 

.88 
8.47 
2.09 
•49 
5-64 
4-57 
3.08 

4-63 

20.04 
26.40 
22.00 
17.69 
20.98 
27.94 
18.15 

21.01 

2.12 

T 

3-35 

8.88 
4-83 

7.88 
5-20 

27.69 

.91 

1.50 

2-43 

1.41 

23-55 

Walhalla 

Washburn 

Wild 

Rice 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

Apr, 

May 

June 

An'l. 

1892  ..  . 
1893  ... 
1894  ... 
1895  ... 
1896  ... 
1897  ..  . 
1898  .  .  . 
1800 

3-73 
4.06 
2.17 
3-79 
•71 
2.31 

•83 
1.82 
i.6x 

4.08 
.62 
4.24 

3.06 
4.84 
5-54 

2.  2O 

5-74 
1.70 

22.29 
20.98 
20.23 
25.06 
24.48 

4.09 
.16 

•32 
1.85 
•45 

3-3° 
2.56 
.09 

I-5S 

4-35 

2.90 
3.00 

2-97 
2.78 

3-23 

15-83 
17.71 

j.  oyy  .  .  . 
I9OO 



I9O2 

IOO3 

1904  ..  . 

1905  ••• 
1906  .  .  . 
1907  ... 

Av.  Annual  for 
each  Station 

•  'T- 

.69 
•30 

3-42 
3-67 
3-36 

8.05 
6-43 
5-36 

21.66 

.10 

•75 
10 

1.  12 

6.  20 

5-27 
2.30 

4.IO 



22.61 

White  Earth 

Williston 

Willow  City 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l 

1892 

i   i  02 

2.64 
3-28 
i-59 
3-45 
3.18 
.70 
3.68 
6,38 

S.ll 
4.69 
1.98 
3-84 
5.85 
4-38 
i.  80 

16.20 
18.03 

18.45 

15.24 
18.03 

17.19 

1  80^ 

•51 
2.66 

I-31 

3.60 

.00 

".T 
.16 

.20 

•53 
i.  06 
T 

i-37 

•  24 
3-37 
5-71 
•58 

2.60 
•94 

.00 

2.04 
4.04 
i.85 
2-59 

"f 

1804 

i  «jy  <f.  .  .  . 

1895  .-. 
I806 

3.38 

3.62 

2.52 
2.86 
1.17 
i.  08 
.60 

•57 
.46 

•53 
•79 
•78 
.04 

I    ^0 

3.02 

5-79 

.72 

1.  2  I- 

2-39 
1.46 

2.69 

3-94 
1.27 
1.74 

4  c  e 

3-67 
3-45 
2.71 

4-56 
3-7° 
-65 
8.84 
3-92 
2.06 
2-58 
3-44 

17.06 
22.04 
12.19 
14.44 

12.  6l 

15.81 
18.36 

17.68 

9-44 
10.66 

1897  ... 
1898  ... 
l8OO 

i.  20 
i-55 

.08 
.26 

4.00 

IOOO 

IOOI 

1902  ..  . 

IQO3 





TOO  4. 

100^ 

j-yv^    .. 
I9OO 

1907  ... 

Av.  Annual  for 
each  Station 

.... 

.... 

.... 

.... 

•53 

I.OI 

2.03 

16.03 

.10 

372 


TABLES   SHOWING   AVERAGE   PRECIPITATION— Continued. 


Wishek 

Woodbridge 

Yates,  Fort 

Apr. 

May  |  June 

An'l. 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l. 

1802 

2.21 

.68 

2-77 
1.04 
7.78 
.04 
•93 
•85 
.16 

1.03 
1.24 
.72 

3-J5 

4.88 

•65 
•i5 
1.92 
.o<; 

2.92 
4.62 
3-47 
3-77 

•77 
2.44 
4.08 

4-45 

16.18 
17.04 
16.95 
16.22 

24-95 
12.26 
13.68 
12.80 

4.80 
1.62 
3-51 
2-97 
3-Si 
3-25 
2.90 

•71 

.10 

.12 

J-JS 

I.OO 

•56 

•56 

87 

1.47 
1.56 
.80 
1.07 
1.98 
.80 
4-05 
5.02 
.20 
.18 
3.12 

!-33 
1.58 
2.91 

3-°4 
4.91 

2.10 

4-33 

3-55 
2.85 

3-32 
5-64 

I-I5 
4.81 

3-49 
2.08 
7.41 
2.38 

21.23 
16.30 

12.  2O 
12.96 
2O.O8 
18.32 

I9-S5 
17.71 
16.80 
13-42 
16.49 
15.00 
17.30 

*«y*  •  •  • 

1801 

•«-«-»y,5    •  •  • 

1804 

x;rV*f  •  •  • 

i8o«> 

1806   . 

1807    . 

1898  ... 
1899  ... 
I9OO 

TQO  I 

.23 

.65 

4.71 

IOO2 

•47 

4.96 

4-47 

20.51 

IOO3 

1904   ... 
1905    .- 
1906   ..  . 
1907   ..  . 

Av.  Annual  for 
each  Station 

i.  60 
1.29 

>? 

2-15 
3-64 
4-45 
2.90 

7.07 
2.48 
2.66 
1.70 

20.02 
18.26 

.12 

26.03 

3-73 

16.72 

16.70 

Yule 

Average  Annual  for  all  Stations 

Apr. 

May 

June 

An'l 

I8(%2 

19.32 
16.47 
15.81 
24.06 

23-43 
16.47 
16.16 

J7-56 
18.60 
18.66 
19.64 
18.97 
19.27 
20.78 

20.  14 

1892  ..  . 
1893  ... 
1894  ..  . 

1  80  3 

.61 

3-71 

2.18 

1804 

rfifve 

1895  .  .  . 

ioyo  • 

1896.. 

180*7 

1896  ... 



1897'..  . 

1898  ... 

i&nn 

1899  ..  . 

1  °yy  

TOGO 

1901  

1  9O  I 

1902    ..  . 

TOO  3 

1903    ..  . 

TOO  A 

1904    .  .  . 

1905. 

1906. 

M 

1905    ..  . 

I9O6      . 

ean  Annual  Precipi 
Stations  having  rec 

tation  for  all 
;ords  

18.59 

I9O7      . 

Av.  Annual  for 
each  Station 

AN  INDEX. 


PAGE 

Advance  and  Retreat  of  the  Ice-front 42,  58 

Age  of  a  Landscape 166 

Age  of  Reptiles,  in  North  Dakota 190 

Ages  of  Rivers 237 

Agriculture  West  of  Missouri  River 245 

Alexandria,  S.  D 120 

Alkali  Flats 164 

Alkali  in  Soils 275,  286 

Alkali  Lakes 48,  164 

Altamont  Moraine,  The  Described.  .  .  .221  et  seq 

Altamont  Moraine 112,214,  244,  323,  359 

Antelope  Hills 119 

Antelope  Moraine ' 119 

Archaean,  The 209 

Area  of  Lake  Agassiz 81,  110 

Area  of  Lake  Agassiz  in  Canada,  Minnesota, 

and  North  Dakota 86 

Area  of  Lake  Dakota. 120 

Area  of  Lake  Sargent .  120 

Area  of  Lake  Souris 116 

Artesian  Springs 165 

Artesian  Water,  Source  of 165,  259 

Artesian  Wells 258 

Artesian  Wells,  Depths  of 260 

Artesian  Well,  Grafton 261 

Artesian  Wells  in  Red  River  Valley 261 

Artesian  Wells,  Minerals  of 262 

Artesian  Wells,  Not  from  Dakota  Sandstone.  .  263 

Assiniboine  Delta 115 

Assiniboine  River,  Manitoba 115 

Augites 25 

Badger  Creek,  Manitoba 115,  124 

Bad  Lands,  The 23,  71,  77,  173 

Bad  Lands,  Mistaken  Notions  about 173 

Bad  Lands,  Cause  of 174,  187,  240 

Bad  Lands  Not  Bad 188 

Bad  Lands,  Named 241 

Balfour  Ridge 119 

Base-leveled  Plain  West  of  Missouri  River  .  . .  187 

Beaches  of  Lake  Agassiz,  Uplifted.  .  . '. 108 

Beach -lines  of  Devils  Lake 125 

Bed-rock 28,  77 

Beginnings  of  North  Dakota,  The.    202 

Bell,  Dr.  Robert,  Cited. 108 

Big  Bend,   Sheyenne  River 82,  94 

Big  Butte,  see  Mauvais  Butte 123 

Big  Coulee  Outlet  of  Lake  Souris 115,  119,  122 

Big  Coulee,  Pierce  County 114,  116 

Big  Horn  Mountains,  Wyoming 74 

Big    Stone    Lake,    Minnesota 80,81 

Black  Hills,  South  Dakota .74 


Blanchard  Beaches 83,  104,  109,  327 

Blanchard  Stage  of  Lake  Agassiz 104 

Blue  Hills 123,  124 

Bois  des  Sioux  River 328 

Boulder  Chains 83 

Boulder-clay,  or  "till" : 90 

Boulder  Patches 59 

Boulders,  "Foreign" 62,  63 

Boulders,  Kinds  and  Sizes 62 

Boulders,  Large ; 22 

Boulders,    Scattered    Over   Bottom   of    Lake 

Souris 117 

Boulders,  Traveled 59 

Boulder-strewn  Prairies 62 

Breaks,  The,  North  of  Dickinson 21,  178 

Buffalo  Boulders 63 

Buffalo  Lake,  Pierce  County 114 

Buffalo  River,  Minnesota 86,  93 

Buford 73,  74 

Building  Stone 357 

Burnside  Beach 109 

Butte,  in  Pembina  County 98 

Butites 21,  77 

Buttes,  Forms  of 176 

Buttes,  The  Older 186 

Buttes,  The  Structure  of 180,  240 

Buttes    Standing    on    Shoulders    of 

Buttes 186,  224 

Caledonia,  Depth  of  Lake  Agassiz 85 

Cambrian  Formation,  The 209 

Camel's  Hump 187,  243 

Campbell  Beach 96,  103,  104,  107,  315,  329,  332 

Campbell  Beach,  Across  Deltas 102 

Campbell    Beach,    Multiple 107 

Campbell  Stage 104 

Cannon  Ball  River,  The 235,  238 

Carboniferous  Formations,  The 209 

Cass  County,  Sheyenne  Delta  in 94 

Cause  of  Existing  Lakes,  The iol 

Cause  of  Lake  Dakota 120 

Chain-of -Lakes,  The  Alice 148 

Channel    Connecting    Sheyenne    and    James 

Valleys 114 

Clay,  Formed 35 

Clay,  Stratified,  on  Bottom  of  Lake  Agassiz    91 

Cliff,  Wave-cut 94,  96 

Climate  of  Western  North  Dakota 246 

Clyde  Series  of  Soils,  The 284 

Coal  Beds,  How  Old 210 

Coal  Beds,  How  Formed V 193 

Coal  in  Bad  Lands .  .  201 


373 


374 


AN  INDEX. 


Coal  in  North  Dakota,  History  of  Formation 

of 190  et  seq 

Coal  Measures,  The  Western 196 

Coal  Mine  in  Cellar 201 

Coal  Seams,  Elevations  of 201 

Common  Wells 267 

Conditions,   Causing  Lake  Agassiz,  The....    79 

Copper  and  Lead 298 

Coteau   des    Prairies 72,  78,  79,  81,  120,  121,  214 

Coteaus  of  the  Missouri,  The 213  et  seq 

Coteau  du  Missouri 21,  73,  74,  78,  112,  244 

Coulee,  or  Young  Valley 17 

Cretaceous  Era 77 

Cretaceous  Inland  Sea,  The 77 

Cretaceous  Rocks 101 

Cretaceous  Shale  in  Delta  Sand 98 

Cretaceous  Shales 96,  97,  124 

Cretaceous,  The,  in  North  Dakota 202  et  seq 

Crust  of  Earth,  Changes  in  Form  of.  ...  105,  107 

Custer's  Trail,  through  the  Bad  Lands 183 

Custer  Trail  Ranche 184 

Cut-off  at  Lisbon 139 

Cut-off  at  Valley  City 142 

Cycle  of  Erosion 15 

Dakota  Glacier 47,  48,  98,  115 

Dakota  Glacier  and  Lake  Dakota 119 

Dakota  Glacier  in  South  Dakota 52 

Dakota  Glacier,  Moraine  Formed  by.  ...    84,  112 

Dakota  Sandstone,  The 203 

Dam,  Restraining  Waters  of  Lakes  Winnipeg, 

etc 85 

De  Groat  Lake 125 

Delta,  Photograph  of 95 

Deltas  and  Beaches  of  Lake  Agassiz,  The .  . 

86,  92,  110 

Depth  of  Drift  about  Devils  Lake 124 

Depth  of  Great  Ice-sheet 70,  79,  80,  117 

Depth  of  Lake  Agassiz 82,  85,  111 

Depth  of  Lake  Dakota .- 120 

Depth  of  Lake  Sargent 121 

Descent  of  Red  River  Valley 85 

Des    Lacs    River 112,  119,  355 

Devils    Heart    Hill 57,124 

Devils  Lake 21,  22,  30,  52,  75,  115,  122 

Devils  Lake,  History  of 123-128 

Devils  Lake,  Ice  on  Hills  South 93,  114 

Devonian  Formation,  The 209 

Dog  Den  Butte 21,  73,  112 

Dovre  Moraine 81,  103,  116,  120-122 

Drainage  West  of  Missouri  River 234,  235 

Drift  Boulders 29 

Drift  Clay 151 

Drift  Clay,  of  Red  River  Valley '90 

Drift,  Depth  of 29,  77 

Drift,  Mantle 76,  77 

Drift  on  High  Mountains 33 

Drift    Period,    Denned 29 

Drift  West  of  Missouri  River 225 

Drift,  The  Older  and  the  Newer 224 

Dry  Lake 125 

Duck  Mountain,  Manitoba 110 

Dunes. . .  . .  94,  95,  118,  322,  329,  348,  350 


PAGE 

Dunes,  of  Sheyenne  Delta 94 

Dune  Tracts,  Lake  Soums 117 

Eckelson  Lake 159 . 

Edinburg 84,  98,  106 

Elevation  Above  Sea -level  of  State 73 

Elevation  of  Basin  of  Lake  Agassiz.  .  .  .108,  109 

Elk-River 86,  92, 93,  98,  102,  316,  331 

Elk  River  Valley,  a  Sound  or  Strait. 101 

Elk  Valley 84,  98,  316 

Elk  Valley  Delta 315,  316 

Elk  Valley  Delta,  The.  .53,  84,  92,  93,97,98,  100,  103 

Emerado  Beach 109,  316 

Epeirogenic  Movements  of  the  Earth's  Crust  108 

Excursion  among  the  Boulders,  An ?23 

Excursion  to  Some  Glaciers,  An 39 

Extinct  Lakes,  Denned 161 

Fargo 21,  73,  75,  81 

Fargo,  Section  Across  Valley 90 

Feldspar 24 

Fergus  Falls  Moraine,  The.  .82,  83,  100,  110,  133,320 

Fergus  Falls  Moraine  and  Lake  Agassiz 103 

Fifth  or  Elysian  Moraine 122 

First  or  Altamont  Moraine 50,  116 

First   Pembina   Mountain 95,  96 

Forests,  Submerged 125 

Formations,  The  Geologic  in  North  Dakota.  .  203 

Fossils  Stumps  Associated  with  Coal 192 

Fort  Benton  Formation,  The 197,  203 

Fort  Pierre  Formation  The 97,  124,  197,  203 

Fourth    or   Kiester   Moraine 114,  122 

Fox  Hills  Sandstone  in  Buttes 342 

Fox  Hills  Formation,  The 163,  197,  203 

Future  of  North  Dakota,  The 303 

Gary  Moraine 112 

Geology  from  Car  Window  Prefatory  Note.  .  313 

Girard  Lake 114 

Glacial  Channels 262 

Glacial  Elk    River 53,  92,  100 

Glacial  Lake  Agassiz 76,  79 

Glacial  Lake  Dak6ta 119 

Glacial  Lakes. 49,  151 

Glacial  Lake  Sargent 120 

Glacial  Lakes,  Extinct 31 

Glacial  Lake  Souris 112 

Glacial  Lake,  Temporary ' 50 

Glacial  Period 30 

Glacial  Period,  Denned 29 

Glacial  Period,  Time  Since 210 

Glacial  Rivers 49 

Glacial  Soils  West  of  Missouri  River 250 

Glacier,  Conditions  for  Forming  of 35 

Gladstone  Beach 109,  110 

Gold 296 

Gold  and  Things  not  Gold 296 

Gold,  Mica  Mistaken  for 298 

Gold  in  Hard  Boulders 297 

Gold  in  Shale 297 

Golden  Valley 84,  98 

Golden  Valley,  Level  Bottom  of 102 

Goose  Rapids ' 83 

Goose  River 22,  75 

Grafton. . .   21,  110,  165,  209 


AN  INDEX, 


375 


PAGE 

Grand  Forks,  Section  Across  Valley 90 

Grand  River,   South  Dakota 78 

Granite,  in  Boulders 24,  25 

Grass  Lake 123 

Gravel  Pits 89 

Great  Divide  or  Height  of  Land 79 

Great  Ice-sheet,  The 30,  35,  36,  53,  70,  79,  116 

Great  Ice-sheet,  and  the  Missouri  River 74 

Great  Ice-sheet,  Dam  to  Northern  Drainage.  .    86 

Great  Ice-sheet,  in  North  Dakota 47 

Great  Ice-sheet,  Region  not  Covered  by.  ...    71 

Great  Ice-sheet,  Western  Limit 73 

Great  Northern  Railway,  Highest  Point  of.  .   123 

Great  Plains,  The  230 

"Great  Salt  Lake"  of  North  Dakota. 123 

Great  Stone  Face,  The 243 

Ground  Moraine,  Defined 38 

Gumbo  Soils  West  of  Missouri  River 253,  285 

Gypsum 300 

Hanging  Valley  of  the  Maple,  The 139 

Hard  Head  Boulders,  Origin  of 209 

Hawk's  Nest 73 

Heart?  River,  The 78,  235,  238 

Heerman,  Captain,  Cited 128 

Height   of   Land 79,  81 

Herman  Beach.  .  .82,  94,  104,  107,  108,  110,  315,    316 

330,  335 

Herman  Beach,  Across  Deltas 110 

Herman  Beach ,  Beginning  of 103 

Herman  Beach,  Multiple 106 

Herman  Stage  of  Lake  Agassiz.82,  102,  108, 110,  111 

Hillsboro  Beach 109,  326 

Hills,  East  and  West,  Compared 20 

Hills,  Morainic 36 

Hills,  South  Devils  Lake 52 

Hills,  Types  of 23 

Horneblende 24 

Hudson's  Bay,  Filled  with  Ice 86 

Hurricane  Lake 123 

Ibsen  Lake 123 

Ice,  Behavior  of,  Under  Pressure 32,  35 

Ice-cascade .  . . ; 44 

Ice-dam,  Cause  of  Lake  Souris 112 

Ice-flow,  Due  to  its  Weight 34 

Ice  Movement,  Direction  of 31 

Ice-sheet,  Thickness  of 33 

Ice,  Stratified .44,  54 

Ice-water,   From   Melting  Glacier 41,  44,  49 

Inkster,  Profile  at 100 

Iron  Minerals 293 

Iron  Pyrites 293 

Island  Lake 123 

Islands  in  Lake  Agassiz 101 

Islands,  on  East  Shore  of  Lake  Winnipeg.  ...    85 

Itasca  Lake,  Minnesota . 84 

Itasca  Moraine 101,  110,  316,  317,  333 

Itasca  'Stage,  Dakota  Glacier 84 

James  River 73,  74,  79,  114,  115,  116,  121 

James  River,  Dammed  by  Ice 120 

James  River,  Enlarged  to  Form  Lake  Dakota  119 

James  River  Valley 74,  114,  119,  121,  151,  213 

Jura -Trias  Formations,  The 209 


PAGE 

Jerusalem 124,  128 

Joint  Terminal  Moraine 54,  68 

Jotenheimen  Mountains,  Norway 39 

Kettle  Moraine 320 

Kiester  Moraine 114 

Killdeer  Mountains 187 

Knife  River,  The 235,  238 

Laccolite  Mountains 231 

Lac  des  Roches 115,  124 

Lagoon,  Formed  Behind  Sand-bar 89 

Lake  Agassiz 74,  119,  121,  122,  151 

Lake  Agassiz,  Area  of -. 81,  110 

Lake  Agassiz,  Compared  in  Time  with  Lake 

Souris 116 

Lake  Agassiz,  History  of 109 

Lake  Agassiz,  How  Caused 102 

Lake  Agassiz,  Increase  in  Size  of 82 

Lake  Agassiz,  in  Relation  to  Deltas 102 

Lake  Agassiz  Opened 148 

Lake  Agassiz,  Outlet  of 80 

Lake  Agassiz,  West  Shore  of 75 

Lake  Bottom  Lands 307 

Lake  Dakota 74,  119,  121,  122 

Lake  Dakota,  Extent  of 120 

Lakes,  Kinds  of 151 

Lakes,  Map  Studies  of 157 

Lakes,  Meaning  of  on  Landscape 166 

Lake  Sargent 120,  121,  122,  151 

Lake  Souris 74,  114-116,  151 

Lake  Superior,  Outlet  to 104 

Lakes  on  Turtle  Mountain 162 

Lakota,  Moraines  Near 84 

Lanona  Plain,  The 131,  140 

Laramie  Formations 197,  203,  207 

Laramie  Formations,  Thickness  of  in  North 

Dakota 200 

Larimore  22,  30,  36,  53,  72,  78,  86,  98 

Lateral  Moraine 37,  43 

Lead — Copper  and — 298 

Leaf  Hills  Moraine. 52,  83,  84,  100,  110,  316,  319,  320 

Leaf  Hills  Stage  of  Lake  Agassiz 101 

Level  of  Lake  Agassiz,  Cause  of 110 

Level  of  Surface  of  Lake  Agassiz,  Deflection  107 

Level -prairie  Portion  of  State 71 

Lightning's  Nest 94 

Lignite  Coal  in  Bad  Lands 181,  188 

Lignite,  Meaning  of  term 195 

Lime  Minerals 299 

Limestone  (Calcium  Carbonate) 301 

Limestone  in  Deep  Well 206 

Lisbon 30,  82,  94,  121,  122,  138 

Little  Missouri  River 21,  74,  78,  178,  184 

Little  Missouri  River,  Danger  of  Piracy  of ...  239 

Little  Missouri  River,  The,  Described 238 

Little  Muddy  Creek 325 

Little  Pembina  River 97 

Long  Lake,  McHenry  County 112 

Long  Lake,  Rolette  County 123 

Lost  Creek 102 

Lowland  Plain,  in  Central  Portion  of  State .  .    78 

Manitoba  Escarpment,  The  .71 , 74, 75, 79, 205  et  seq, 

316,  328,  331,  336 


376 


AN  INDEX. 


PAGE 

Manitoba  Lake 58,  81,  85,  110,  111 

Manitoba,  Multiple  Beaches  in 106 

Maple  Lake,  Minn.,  Beaches  Near 106 

Maple  Ridge 335 

Maple  River,  The  History  of 143 

Marshall  Series  of  Soils,  The 283 

Mauvais  Butte 123,  124,  319 

Mauvaise  Coulee 115,  123,  318 

Mayville 22,  83,  98 

Mayville,  Contour  Line 87 

McCauleyville  Beach 96,  102-105,  107,  109,  315 

329,  330 

McCauleyville  Stage  of  Lake  Agassiz.  .103,  105,  109 

Medial  Moraine 37,  49 

Medora 183-4,  347 

Mesabi  Moraine 85,  110 

Milnor  Beach 82 

Mine,  A  Burning 241 

Minerals,  Non-Metallic 299 

Mineral  Resources 308 

Minerals  in  North  Dakota 291 

Minnesota  Glacier 47,  48,  83,  98,  116 

Minot 22,  59,  60,  73,  116,  118,  123 

Missouri  Plateau,  The.  .112,  116,  123,  186,  197,  207, 
213,  214,  218,  229  et  seq 

Missouri  Plateau,  The  Eastern  Slope  of.  .219,220 
Missouri  Plateau,  East  of  Missouri  River.  .  .  .  244 

Missouri  Plateau,  Structure  of 241 

Missouri  River,  Landscape  East  and  West 

Compared 166,  217,  234,  284 

Missouri  River,  The 23,  26,  30,  71,  73,  74 

76,  78,  112,  224 

Missouri  River,  The,  at  Bismarck 342 

Missouri  Slope,  The 73,  224,  235 

Monadnocks 233,  242 

Moraines,  Denned 36 

Moraines  Formed  upon  Bottom  of  Lake 

Souris 118 

Moraine  Leveled,  in  Red  River  Valley 83 

Morainic  Hills 76,  83 

Morainic  Lakes . 47,  76,  151 

Morainic  Lakes,  Formed 38 

Morainic  Lakes,  Typical  Group  of 163 

Morainic  Ridges 36,  37,  41,  43 

"Mountains,  The" 49,  84,  101,  332,  333 

Mouse  River 74,  79,  114,  117,  119 

Mouse  River  Valley 71,  123,  151,  197,  213 

Nelson  River  Outlet  of  Lake  Agassiz.  .85,  109,  111 

Niobrara  Formation 197,  203 

Niverville  Stage  of  Lake  Agassiz \ll 

Norcross  Beach.. 96,  102,  106,  107,  108,  110,  316,  330 

Norcross  Stage  of  Lake  Agassiz 103, 104, 108, 109 

Oakes 21,  30,  36,  71,  120 

Ojftta  Beach 315 

Old  Buttes 242 

Old  Drift 324 

Old  North  Dakota 76,  77,  123 

Old  (Pre -glacial)  Landscape  of  North  Dakota  76 

Old  River  Valley 123,  124 

Older  Rocks  of  Eastern  North  Dakota,  The.  .  209 

Ossawa  Beach 109 

Outlet  at  Lake  Traverse ...  .  .  108,  109 


PAGE 

Outlet   Lake  Agassiz,   South,   Map   Showing 

Beaches 105,  107 

Outlet  Lake  Agassiz  to  Lake  Superior 105 

Outlet  of  Lake  Agassiz,  Northeast  86,  104,  109,  110 

Outlet  of  Lake  Agassiz,  South 103,  104,  109,  110 

Outlet  of  Lake  Souris 112 

Outlet  of  Lake  Souris  by  Girard  Lake  and 

Big  Coulee 114 

Over- wash  Plains 52 

Ox-bow  of  Mouse   River , 74,  112,  116 

Ox-bows  in  River  Courses 75 

Pembina  Delta,  The 92,  95,  98,  103,  115 

Pebbles  Mistaken  for  Drift  West  of  Missouri 

River 253 

Pembina  Mountain 72,  78,  79,  95,  96,  98,  115, 

316,  328,  331,  333,  336 

Pembina   Mountain   Highland 53,   71,   81 

Pembina    Mountain,    Underlying   Rock   For- 
mations      96- 

Pembina  River 75,  86,  92,  95,  97,  115 

Pembina  River  Outlet  of  Lake  Souris 116 

Petrified   "Butterfly" 67 

Petrified  Forests,  The 188,  346 

Petrified  Wood,   How  Formed 188 

Pictured  Rock,  at  Fort  Ransom 305 

Plateau  Region  of  North  Dakota,  The 229 

Plateaus,  Lesser 232 

Pony  Gulch 112,  158 

Pyramid  Park 346 

Quartz 23 

Quartz,  in  Granite 24,  25 

Quartzite 27 

Quartzite  Boulders 23-25 

Rainfall  in  North  Dakota 310 

Rainfall    in    Western    North    Dakota 247 

also  see  Appendix. 

Red  River  of  the   North 76,  78,  79,  121,  123: 

Red    River    of    the    North,    Axis    of    Lake 

Agassiz  Bottom 105 

Red  River  of  the  North,  Crossed  by  Moraines  83, 84 

Red  River  of  the  North,  Early 110 

Red  River  of  the  North,  Elevations  of 73 

Red  River  of  the  North,  Flood  of 125 

Red  River  of  the  North,  Valley  of 206,  209 

Red  River  Valley,  Bottom  of  Lake  Agassiz.  .     85 

Red  River  Valley,  Buried  by  Ice 116 

Red  River  Valley,  Depth  of  Drift  in 80 

Red  River  Valley,  Fertility 57,  58,  86 

Red  River  Valley,  Leveled  Drift  Materials.  .  83 
Red  River  Valley,  Low  Lands  of  Lagoons.  .  89 
Red  River  Valley,  Section  at  Wahpeton ....  89 

Red  River  Valley,  The 21,  22,  71,  75,  79,  88,  151 

Ridges  of  Drift  Forming  Islands 122 

Ridges,  of  Shore  Sand  and  Gravel 88 

"Ridge"  The 49,  84,  100,  101,  316,  331,  333 

River  of  Lakes,  The 164 

River  Ransom,  The 135,  348 

Rivers,  Work  of  in  Western  North  Dakota.  .  233 

Rivers  of  Western  North  Dakota,  The 235 

Roosevelt  Cabin,  in  Bad  Lands 184 

Salt  Beds  on  Lake  Bottoms 155 

Salt  Lakes  from  Artesian  Springs 165 


AN  INDEX. 


377 


PAGE 

Salts  and  Alkalies,  Sources  of 155 

Salts  in  Lake  Waters 154 

Salts  in  Soils 275 

Sandstone  Concretions 295 

Sand  Prairie  Spillway,  The 133 

Sand  Prairie 134 

Sand-bars,  Built  by  Waves 88 

Sand  Dunes,  McHenry  County 118 

Sandstone  South  of  Turtle  Mountains 117 

Scoria  as  Natural  Brick 182 

Sea  Bottom,  Ancient,  in  North  Dakota 202 

Second  or  Gary  Moraine 112 

Second    Pembina   Mountain 96,  97 

Section,  Generalized,  in  North  Dakota 202 

Sentinel  Butte..  / 73,  241 

Seventh  or  Dovre  Moraine 116 

Sheyenne  Delta,  Area 94 

Sheyenne  Delta,  Beginning  of 82 

Sheyenne  Delta,  Section 94 

Sheyenne  Delta,  Stage  of  the  Lake 102 

Sheyenne  Delta,  Structure 94 

Sheyenne  Delta,  The .  .  92,  93,  98,  103,  115,  206,  350 
Sheyenne  River.  .21,  49,  73,  75,  79,  81,  86,  92-94, 

115,    116,    124,    125 
Sheyenne  River,  Beginning  of  Lake  Agassiz .  .  109 

Shore  Boulder  Chains 61 

Silurian  Formation,  The 209 

Silt,  Deposited  in  Lake  Agassiz 86,  92 

Sioux  Quartzite 27,  120 

Sixth,  or  Waconia  Moraine 122 

Soil,  Composed  of 28 

Soil  Classes,  The 287 

Soil,  Denned 269 

Soil  Map,  Making  of  a 277 

Soil  Map  of  North  Dakota,  The 289 

Soil,  Organic  Matter  in 276 

Soils,  A  Study  of  The 269 

Soils,  Classification  of 287 

Soils,    Derived    from    Different    Kinds    of 

Rock , 273 

Soils  of  the  Glacial  Lakes 279 

Soils  of  the  Rolling  Prairies 282 

Soils,  Their  Study  a  Geological  Problem 269 

Soil  Regions,  The,  of  North  Dakota 278 

Soil  Series,  The 288 

Soil  Survey,  How  Made 277 

Soils  West  of  Missouri  River :  249,  284 

Stages  of  Lake  Agassiz 102,  104 

Stonewall  Beach. . .  .  .  109 


PAGE 

Stormy  Lakes 120,  121 

Strata,  Defined 27 

Stratified  Gravel  and  Sand  in  Sand-pits ....     63 

Stria- 53,55 

Striated  Boulder 53,  55 

Stump  Lake 115-128 

Sully 's  Hill 57,  124 

Terminal  Moraine,  Defined 37,  59 

Terminal  Moraines 36,  40,  45,  46,  50 

Terminal  Moraine,  How  Formed 217 

Terminal  or  Dump  Moraine,  Illustration  of.  .  316 

Terraces  of  Sheyenne  Valley 140,  339 

Tewaukon  Lake 121,  122 

Third  or  Antelope  Moraine 119 

Till,  or  Boulder-clay 90 

Till,  Underlying  Delta 97 

Tintah  Beaches 96,  102,  103,  107,  109,  315 

Tongue  River 75,  96 

Traverse  Lake 79-81,  85,  103,  121,  328 

Turtle  Mountains.  . .  55,  57,  73,  74,  78,  114-116, 

123,  321 

Turtle  Mountain  Plateau,  The 79,  163,  207,  233 

Types  of  Landscape,  Three  Described.  .218  et  seq 

Upham,  Warren,  Cited 81 

Valley  City 21,  30,  36,  121 

Veneered  Hills 55,  57,  58,  123,  336 

Wahpeton  and  Breckenridge,  Depth  of  Lake 

Agassiz  at - 82,  85 

Wahpeton,  Section  Across  Valley 89 

Warren,  Gen.  G.  K 81 

Warren,   River 80-82,   104,   105,   115 

Washington  Lakes 125 

Watershed  between  Devils  Lake  and  Mouse 

River 123,  319 

Watershed,  between  Hudson  Bay  and  Gulf  of 

Mexico 219 

Watershed  between  Little  Missouri  and  Heart 

Rivers 184,  235,  345 

Water  Supply,  The,  in  North  Dakota 258 

Water  Supply,  West  of  Missouri  River 256' 

Wells  County,  Old  Channel  in.  .  .  ." 114 

Wheatland,  Profile 89 

Wild  Rice   River 75,   121,   122 

Wild  Rice  River,  Minnesota 93 

Winnipeg    Lake,     Depth    of    Lake    Agassiz 

Over , 85 

Winnipegosis  Lake 81,  111 

Wintering  Creek 119 

Wood  Changed  to  Coal,  Manner  of .  .  ,  ,  .  194 


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